The subtle scent of oak and onion
by SkyeMoor
Summary: Bellatrix Black had made a costly mistake. Worse, she had no idea what she'd done. But, Draco Malfoy was the type to take advantage of any situation, particularly when in such dire straits. And this? This had possibilities... and maybe even a fragile hope.
1. I'm Bored

Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger landed in a cold cavern, the electric snap of blocked spells still hanging over them like a cloak.

From behind them both, Narcissa Malfoy completed her spell, freezing Hermione Granger in place, before Granger had a chance to get even one syllable out.

Draco nodded at his mother, and she smiled smoothly, gesturing towards the small tea table, set with two chairs. "I'll make tea," she said, in her silvered voice.

Quickly, Draco stepped towards Hermione, stepping around her in a short, tight circle - as if assessing a quality broodmare. His nose was full of her scent, made pungent by the adrenalin surge of battle. Oak... and onion. As he inhaled, he realized that she was ripe... fertile... Angrily, he shook his head, thinking, _that's cheating -_ and trying his best to put thoughts of how to turn that to his favor out of his mind, _entirely_. Nevermind that he had already generated at least three plans. Absentmindedly, he noted the flush on her cheeks, the deep breath she was taking.

Setting his face in order - a seething glare, he strode around her back to face her again. His hand gestured, spinning a chair out from the table, and pushing it behind Hermione Granger. "Sit," Draco commanded, his icy voice matching his steely gaze perfectly, as he dropped the spell holding her petrified. Granger had other ideas (didn't she always, Draco snarked), but her shout turned into an awkward squawk as Draco shoved her down into the chair, his little wandless spell making it as though the ropes curled around her by themselves. Granger braced herself to keep from shrieking at the entrapment, no matter that Draco caught the wordless terror in her eyes.

"What do you want?!" Granger fairly shrieked, her adrenaline pumping through her veins like venom, pushing her far off any productive paths.

Draco Malfoy raised an eyebrow, waiting a moment before he smoothly drawled, in a voice as slow as syrup, "I'm bored." No one but a Gryffindor would take that as the truth - and weren't they convinced that Slytherins always lied? "Perhaps you can conceive of something interesting for me to do?"

"Go to hell!" Granger shouted, and Draco was certain his mother was shaking her head, and silently mouthing "manners."

"Now that would be _utterly_ boring. Surely you can do better than that. Be _creative_. If it's amusing enough, I might actually do it." Draco held all the cards here, and he wasn't bothering to show even a scrap of stray emotion on his face.

Granger sputtered, and then looked at him with a flinty gaze. _I bet I could strike sparks off that glare_ , Draco thought. "Spatter yourself with acid, dive through a ring of fire, sink to the bottom of an endless, icy pit, and feel yourself encased by rubble until you cannot bear to breathe." With each command, Draco cast a spell, quietly but deliberately using his wand. By the end, Granger could feel the sizzle dripping behind her, and listen to the crackle of flames.

Draco Malfoy leaned over her, his silvery eyes suddenly level with her mudbrown ones. "Very good." And then his face twisted into an evil, genuine smile. "You first." With a wave of his wand, Hermione Granger spun towards the doom that awaited her. As she spun, she saw frozen people, their identities mutely recorded for later consideration. Two she recognized, two thought lost - or missing... Bellatrix Black and Mad-eye Moody. And, nearly as she came face to face with a spray of acid, the ghastly figure of Severus Snape.

[a/n: This was supposed to be a oneshot, single scene piece. But apparently my characters like cliffhangers. Glare at them, not me, and write a review!

Snape simply always looks ghastly. What else do you call pale and sallow, anyway?]


	2. Coil, Sight, then Strike

A split second before Hermione Granger would have plummeted to her inevitable doom, Draco Malfoy froze everything. Leaning down over her, he drawled, "I think I've changed my mind. Surely we can come up with something more entertaining than mutual destruction?" Leaning back, Draco Malfoy assessed the young witch, his careful eyes awaiting the show. He was betting on fireworks.

Granger blinked, once and then again. Undoubtedly mentally assessing the new information he had given her, in that swoop to death's doorstep. Flashes of myriad possibilities moved bodily across her face. Then her eyes blazed, "You're the one! You've been doing the portkeys... _all_ the portkeys! You have no idea how worried we've been!"

 _And you aren't worried now?_ Malfoy caught himself before saying, taking a seat by the teatable, facing Hermione Granger. _Of course not, this is Hermione Granger, and there's a mystery afoot! No time to worry, no time to be scared. But, plenty of time to_ ** _demand_** _answers._ His legs stuck out, and crossed, revealing midcalf black boots, a bit more worn than Malfoys generally wore. It was a good pose, worthy of Lucius Malfoy, but Draco hadn't the disaffected nature to pull it off right now. As it was, Hermione Granger mused, he looked like a veritable Peter Pan, all coiled up and ready to spring.

All at once, Granger seemed to freeze, cocking her head slightly at Malfoy, "You did this for a reason... _all_ of this for a reason..."

"Oh, we all have our reasons, some grand some mundane. Just like some desires are ethereal, celestial ... and others carnal..." Malfoy said, his dismissive tone deliberately light. He didn't really want to think why he had thrown that last bit in, but fortunately, he was certain Granger wouldn't pay it much heed. With an almost absentminded gesture, he vanished the hoops of death, and set Granger's chair down on all four legs.

Closing her eyes, Granger squeezed them shut for a moment, before relaxing - and asking, with her eyes still closed, " _What_ do you want?" _Careful, that's the picture of a cat wrapped in a blanket - baleful eyes declaring doom, just as soon as the blanket's gone._

Leaning forward, Malfoy stared at her, momentarily astonished - and since she wasn't looking, it didn't hurt to pause a moment. Truth be told, he had expected more yelling - and more questions, Granger certainly seemed an unstoppable fount of them. Dealing with Gryffindors was easy, after all - just keep them offbalance. Ravenclaws, however, seemed to find their footing in mysteries, clawing up the mountain barehanded without even a scaling-rope - at least this girl had the good sense to simply _ask_ about the answer. Drawing himself back, relaxing into a more neutral expression, Draco smiled slowly.

"All in good time, Granger, all in good time. First, I've got a question for you... What's your line in the sand? What will you not do for the _Greater Good_?" Even stretched out as he was, Malfoy resembled a coiled snake, eyes sparkling and dead on target. This was the question he needed to know the truthful answer to. His entire mien sharpened, as he used his senses to feel for even the hint of a lie.

Opening her eyes, Granger blinked, and responded promptly, "No torture" and then, after a pause, "no unnecessary murder, either." Draco Malfoy's eyes nocked away from hers, sweeping up and down her figure.

Cocking his head to one side, Malfoy studied her. "You're not lying." Malfoy said, deliberately keeping his face unexpressive, sparing only a nod. _It was his answer too... Which was good, very good indeed. It made this... feasible, at any rate._

"Now, as to what I want, I'd like to see you as the next Minister of Magic." Draco said, pausing a moment at the look of absolute outrage on Granger's face. Smugly, he raised an eyebrow.

[a/n: yep, Draco's still picking when the chapter's over. Has anyone figured out Bella's mistake yet? If you have, or even if you haven't, post a review!]


	3. Figureheads, Mastheads, What's the Diff?

Hermione Granger let out a piercing scream. "You're trying to mindfuck me! Is this bribery now? What the hell do you _want_? Are you trying to use me as a figurehead?"

When Hermione Granger got a good head of steam, she wasn't the type to stop, or even let people actually answer her questions, Draco Malfoy mused, momentarily ignoring Hermione, simply because she couldn't possibly expect him to keep track of half a hundred separate questions, some of which involved his parentage and apparently a goat. Such language to use around his mother - granted Granger didn't actually realize she was there. Draco Malfoy had plenty of practice at looking attentive while thinking a million miles a minute about something completely different - the Dark Lord wasn't exactly big on back-and-forth, pretty much all you needed to do was look syncophantic - and none of his teachers had ever minded (save Snape) either, so long as he had the right answers.

"You're a right ruddy bastard, you know that? And you're not taking me seriously!" Hermione Granger shouted, her glare sharp enough to peel the paint off a barn.

"Of course I'm taking you seriously, otherwise you wouldn't be here." Draco Malfoy said sharply. "What I'm not taking seriously is your anger, as it's completely unwarranted and unfounded. You might as well finish _listening_ to my proposal, before going round the bend."

Hermione Granger stared at him, for a moment, apparently unused to people actually having a coherent logical argument. Although considering who she often accompanied, perhaps that wasn't terribly surprising. Draco Malfoy mused, _although in school I was accompanied by Goyle and Crabbe..._ Draco Malfoy internally shook his head in wry amusement, _It honestly helps if I think of Weasel and Potter as her flunkies. Fits too._ Watching Granger closely, Malfoy waited until she had regained some semblance of composure. _What was it about Gryffindors that made them so prone to flying off the broomhandle?_

"This is a business arrangement, and, like most business arrangements, it's mutually beneficial. That's not bribery, simply good common sense. I don't want you to be a figurehead; I'm not sure you're constitutionally capable of it, to be quite frank - and I'm not sure the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs even understand the concept of a figurehead. They like to follow, to do things together. To actually _have_ a figurehead, involves having enough people with enough power that they're willing to accept a titular ruler, in theory alone." Malfoy said, his voice unruffled by Hermione Granger's anger.

 _And the worst of it was_ , Hermione thought, _he was actually making sense. Damn him, why did he have to actually have a point?_

At her expression, Draco Malfoy smirked, smug in his own sense of superiority. "If anyone's going to be a figurehead, it'll be me."

[a/n: Please don't kill me, Draco was the one who said to end it here! (otoh, I do post chapters much more frequently when they're short). So, read and review!

Yes, we all know how _impossible_ Draco is being, but Hermione is being _nearly_ as bad, blowing up under the leastest provocation. Sparks, everyone.]


	4. Saves Time

Hermione Granger studied Draco Malfoy, not for signs of trustworthiness, but for signs of insanity. Inspecting him as if he were a bug. Draco Malfoy was content to wait, at least this way his eardrums would survive intact.

"Why should I deal with you at all, if you're just going to be a figurehead?" Granger mused, her question almost absentminded as she pondered the implications. Ten different pieces here, and none of them fit decently into one puzzle. There was a thought, maybe there were two.

"It's like chess, you can pick your opponent cleverly. But whatever you do, you can't refuse to _play_. " Draco said, his voice collected and even.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked.

"Right now we have two factions... call them the Traditionalists and the Modernists. They have opposing goals, different objectives for what reality ought to look like. You should know, you've been trying to shape the ambitions of the Modernists, even when you were at Hogwarts." Draco's drawl was slow and patient, even as he studied her beneath his hooded eyes, masking his intent with indifference.

"You mean S.P.E.W.?" Draco could sense the exact moment when Granger would have leaned forward, if she was unbound. This was becoming a puzzle to her, and Granger adored simple solutions. Pity the real world gave them so rarely, wasn't it?

"Precisely." Malfoy couldn't help but appreciate the brevity of the conversation. Trying to explain this to most people would give him headaches. Granger at least had a sharp mind, like an epee.

Malfoy continued, "You can't stop the two sides from clashing. Unless, of course, you absolutely destroy one or the other, which you and I would find an undesireable outcome." Unbidden, the half-eaten face of some nameless warrior rose in Draco's mindscape, staring at him with hollow sockets for eyes.

"Really, the Death Eater doesn't want to completely crush his enemies?" The look on her face was skeptical, and amused.

"Where's the fun in that? Hard to gloat when your enemies are all dead." His madcap smile was Starbuck's, grinning into the teeth of the wind. "No, I'll settle for a victory where no one has to die, if possible. If my father and Dumbledore could manage it, it can't be that hard..."

"You want to bribe the Ministry like your father did?" Hermione asked, tightening the reins on her temper.

"Rather, I want to control the Traditionalists. I don't have the powerbase to do it now, but I will. And that's why I want to be their figurehead. I'll have the standing to cut deals, gain favors, and build alliances. A Slytherin is nothing without patience. In a few years time, I'd be in control in truth." Draco Malfoy thought quietly, _Good thing I'm not really this powerhungry. Someone that powerhungry would only do this_ ** _temporarily_** _, all while plotting betrayal._

 _Even Snape?_ Hermione Granger thought, with an amused pursing of her lips that might pass for a smirk.

"Especially Severus Snape - his impatience at school was quite deliberate, particularly towards you Gryffindors." _Really, wasn't that obvious?_ Malfoy thought.

Hermione blinked, as she realized she had spoken that aloud, and then processing Draco's sensible answer.

Hermione finally spoke, "So you want to deal with me so that you'll acquire power and influence?" _In a twisted, Slytherin sort of way, this makes sense. Burn him, I'd rather he was mad._

"In a way, yes. I think we can do better than my father and Dumbledore did, anyway. They didn't trust each other a whit, and thus were always at loggerheads. Nothing major got accomplished for either side, just little things changing slowly. And I know you don't want that."

"Oh?" Granger had learned this trick from Professor Snape, giving the other person the conversational room to hang themselves.

"Pick and choose your battles. If your side can't win everything, at least they can win some things. And you can help choose which battles the other side wins." _Please, just listen to me - tell me if this won't work,_ Draco Malfoy thought earnestly, deep in a corner of his mind that was slightly less arrogant than the rest.

"You honestly think this will work?"

"Not unless you're willing to put that legendary temper of yours to work, and hex me through the hallways of the Ministry of Magic." _With scenes like that, no one would actually believe they were working together. Besides, Granger was the original_ _Uncorruptible Gryffindor_ _, as SPEW had already proved. Not that anyone would believe_ ** _him_** _if he didn't look like he was trying to corrupt her._

"Oh, so you do have a bribe for me!" Granger said with a girlish giggle, and Malfoy just knew that she'd be clapping her hands together, if they were only free.

[a/n: Read and Review, folks! The more reviews, the more I write!]


	5. What's Wrong with my friends?

"Just one thing wrong with this ideal world, where we get to have our cake and eat it too, rule the world and still have some fun in the meantime." Draco slowly drawled.

Hermione had one word on her lips, one hated man's name. But she didn't get a chance to say it.

"Your friends - Potter and the Weasel" _Facts, facts, stick to the facts. She can't be angry if I just stick to the facts._

"What's wrong with them?"

"They don't understand the rule of law. They don't understand order, or anything other than "All Laws Bend to the Just" " Draco said, his annoyance with their stupid ideas quite apparent in his tone of voice. "Put one hair wrong on one of the Weasley's heads, and there will be trouble. And one doesn't become a war hero without having some pull."

"You think... you think they'd do something _wrong_?"

"I know it. No one's ever taught them to play by the rules, I'm not sure they're even aware rules exist. Certainly they've been out after curfew enough to justify that assumption. And you _can't_ tell me it was always for good reason."

"So, what? What do you want to do to my friends?" Granger eyed Malfoy with a studied wariness that nearly concealed the well-banked rage in her brown eyes.

"They need to go."

"Go Where?"

"Anywhere outside of Britain. I'll pay for it, even. All expenses free trip. Might as well, if they're going to be on the run, might as well do it in style." _There, see? it's easy to separate you from your best friends... I'll even help!_ Draco knew it was a good idea, and that his reasoning was sound too - which was part of the _problem_ , not the solution. He would have far rather not had to make this argument.

"On the run? For how long?"

"Five years tops. I should have most of the Slytherin families locked down by then. Potter and Weasel will serve as a decent distraction, as well as keeping them out of your - our hair."

"Distract whom?"

"Fanatics. Anyone who needs vengeance more than anything else."

"You'd leave them to that?"

"Who wouldn't fancy a trip around the world? Besides, they've been decent enough at avoiding the Death Eaters so far... If you insist, I could get them a bodyguard or two, maybe even an assassin. Might help my work too, that last one..." Draco trailed off contemplatively.

Hermione left him to his contemplation over whatever was within that overstuffed head of his. He had presented this... strangely. Not the way she would have expected, had he been interested in tricking her. The worst parts first, it sounded like, and then the better parts. It was most assuredly odd. Almost as if he wanted her to say no. Silently, she contemplated what he was saying, thinking over the flaws and the benefits.

"They'll get to visit, and Ginny gets to choose."

"Choose?"

"Whether she'd rather Harry or her family" Granger said, already knowing that Ginny would choose Harry, over sheer jealousy if nothing else, and a trip around the world would only help with her determination. Plus, Granger was sure Gin did actually care about Harry, and this was still a good bit dangerous.

Draco thought, _Great, her best girl friend too. Really, could she make this any easier? Maybe Longbottom has a sudden urge to explore the Marianas Trench?_ "Okay. I suppose I can get word to Potter if there's any additional danger, keep some ears out for trouble. I hope to have the fanatics starved of most of their powerbase quickly, of course. And they can visit, for brief intervals, but not around the holidays"

Granger quirked an eyebrow

"Too obvious." _Of course_ , Granger thought.

"Just one question..." Hermione Granger said demurely.

 _Uh oh_ Malfoy thought, this is going to be a handful... "What?" he ground out, his voice impassive even as he restrained his fingers from telling his impatience to everyone concerned.

"What about Voldemort?"

[a/n: and cliffie! Read and review, it'll make me write more!]


	6. Voldemort, the easy part

"Tom Riddle will be the easy part, I fear." Malfoy said, fighting to keep from snorting out his amusement. And now Granger was staring at him like he'd lost his mind. Well, perhaps he had, after all, he was _trusting a Gryffindor_. Still, after spending years trying to kill the Dark Lord, Granger was _undoubtedly_ wondering what Draco had up his sleeve.

"Tom's never been exactly the compromising type, nor the retiring type, if you take my meaning. I won't say I'd be exactly _opposed_ to him merely losing his mind and sitting out a grande retirement where he plays courtier to a legion of ducks, but I don't think that's actually liable to happen. No, if there's going to be an aftermath at all, he needs to die."

"Do you know how to kill him?" Granger asked suddenly, her eyes bright and looking for all the world like she wanted to hear every single detail of his plan. Before, she had looked like a banked fire - now her entire presence suggested a hellish maelstrom, wind sucking fuel into an everburning fire.

"I'll get to that in a bit." Draco said softly, conscious now that she might be able to use wandless magic, and even though his wand was out (if in a relaxed and mostly playful position), that frustrating her too much was probably a bad idea, perhaps even dangerous. "Accio files, " he said with a quiet commanding voice, and there were twenty folders in his hand, each color-coded, and each sealed with their own bindings.

"There are... certain people who won't be exactly happy with a rapprochement, even an irascible one. If at all possible, they should be dealt with before the war is over, rather than afterwards. While I can get most of the Slytherins to heel with enough patience, force of will, manipulation, and, if all else fails, blatant bribery... I worry more about your side. There are certain people we can't leave until later, not without destabilizing everything." _I hope you meant what you said, about no unjustified murders._

"Go on." Hermione Granger said gravely, her body quieting, as she forcefully suppressed her natural desire to ask questions, in order to look like someone to be treated seriously. _She doesn't realize how much like me she looks, when she does that - thank Merlin!_

Tapping the first folder with his wand, they both watched as the string untied itself. "Shacklebolt, abuse of power - particularly towards unarmed prisoners." The folder opened itself, and Hermione began to read the first page.

About halfway through (Draco judged), Hermione looked up and said, "You want us to decide who lives and dies?"

"Someone must. I don't trust the House of Lords, and neither should you. Instituting any reforms will take time, and these people will be undermining our efforts every step of the way. Corrosion isn't something that heals quickly, either. We have one shot at this, I'd like to wield my best spell." Malfoy cleared his throat uncomfortably, "You'll need your hands free to look at the accumulated evidence. It's extensive, though I'm sure you could collaborate and add more to some of the folders. I want you to give me your word that you'll hear me out, listen to me until I've told you everything."

Hermione Granger cocked her head to one side, pouring over what he had asked, "If I say no to this plan?"

"Provided you've listened to it thoroughly, you can go free. Unharmed, of course."

"And if I have changes to your plan?"

"They'd be welcome, though I warn you, I've been working on this for months. You may not be able to improve this." Draco's eyes sparkled, as he lay down the gauntlet. Gryffindors always liked a challenge, and Granger of all people didn't take being told "it's impossible" as anything more than a reason to work harder.

"What will you do if I say no?" Granger asked, her mind tacking to a different part of the solution sea entirely.

"Find some other way to win." Draco said, tilting his head to one side, and then twisting his mouth into a sidelong smirk, "Malfoys _always_ win." Granger rolled her eyes, as Malfoy had known she would. Draco Malfoy was fairly certain she wasn't listening closely enough to see the lurking promise slithering in the high grass - for Malfoy to win, Riddle had to lose.

"Okay. I give you my word that I will listen to you, and hear your plan in its entirety. We will discuss any proposed changes, and decide together whether it is feasible, and whether this partnership will work." Granger was already kicking herself, as she said it, the words catching in her mouth. _What about Harry and Ron?_ But, this was a _challenge_ , and Hermione Granger was _never_ one to back down from one. If it was going to work, she'd just tell her friends and convince them to agree.

[a/n: read and review! Up next: Tea, Biscuits and Treachery!]


	7. Enter the Narcissa

With a few muttered words from Malfoy, Hermione Granger was free, flexing her arm and legs, stretching her back. _There is no way she knows how good of a view she's giving me with that magnificently feline stretch. No way in hell._

"Start looking. If you see someone missing - either side, I want to know about it." Malfoy looked at Granger with those cold, seastone eyes.

And Hermione Granger did, hissing at some of the descriptions of what Kingsley had done, "You've confirmed these? Multiple reliable sources?"

"Are they really that hard to believe?" Malfoy mused idly, and then said in a much more serious tone, "Of course. You'll find the endnotes to be illuminating."

Hermione Granger was truly at home with a pile of paper in front of her, sifting through it as she put folder after folder onto the cardtable, her first glances skimming just the titles. Nearly at the end she paused, "Bellatrix Black? Whyever is she here?"

"My daft aunt is just a little crazy."

"Crazy in love, you mean." And Draco started, momentarily speechless. _Why hadn't I thought of that? "_ She'll be fine, afterwards. She's just in love with Tom Riddle. Pair her with someone who isn't a homicidal sociopath, and she'll be _quietly_ crazy about them." _It was certainly, perfectly, dreadfully obvious._

"Tea?" Narcissa asked, coming quiet as a cat to Hermione's side, carrying one of their best silver platters, with a silver teaset on it.

"Yes, please, dear." Hermione Granger said, her manners impeccable - and treating _Narcissa Malfoy_ as a humble servant. "In the future, you might try not trying to startle your guests."

"Oh, I do apologize." Narcissa twittered in that soprano voice of hers, "for not greeting you earlier. Do tell me if the tea doesn't meet your specifications, it's my first time." And Narcissa Malfoy smiled coquettishly. Draco Malfoy wasn't fooled by one precisely sculpted bit of her hair - her eyes, cold and gray as the sea, hadn't changed from the moment they laid eyes on Granger. Judging, perceptive eyes - cunning as any Slytherin's, confident in their ability to ken the child - _war heroine_ \- mudblood sitting before her.

"Oh, if it's too terrible, I imagine I won't be too put out if you need to try again. I'll even provide instructions, if you like."

"That would be excellent. I don't imagine I'm terribly well suited for the life of a servant."

"Oh, I don't know about that - you have grace and refinement both, and impeccable manners. You'd have made a decent governess, wouldn't you agree?" Out of Granger's line of sight, Draco smirked, enjoying the repartee. Granger was staying just barely within propriety, without making the slightest effort to be more than modestly polite. She had just suggested that Narcissa Malfoy would be good at _working_ , for Merlin's sake! Somehow she had managed to infuse her words with a quiet confidence, turning them from an insult to a proposed compliment.

Looking down at the server, Hermione Granger served herself three lumps of white sugar, and a dash of cream. _Even with that, she's daring Narcissa to reprove her, and if that's not one of the more masterful "setting someone in their place" designs I've ever seen... well, my name must not be Malfoy._

Taking a goodly sip, Hermione Granger smiled, her eyes more than her mouth lighting up the room. "This is lovely, I assure you. I couldn't have done better myself." _And just like that, she establishes being on equal footing with my mother, all the implied insults fading into nothing._

"Join us." Hermione said, her voice final, "And tell me, what do you think about your sister?"

[a/n: I do realize that English don't take tea that way. A bit of a calculated ruffle of feathers, that. Also, sugar's been hard to find, lately.

Read and Review, sparks are coming! (Up next: Hermione finishes reading "the pile" and figures out how Draco means to help with Mr. Riddle.

And for afters: Snape, the one and only!)]


	8. Bella's got Harry sittin' in a tree

"Taking a goodly sip, Hermione Granger smiled, her eyes more than her mouth lighting up the room. "This is lovely, I assure you. I couldn't have done better myself." _And just like that, she establishes being on equal footing with my mother, all the implied insults fading into nothing._

 _Helen of Troy had a face that could launch a thousand ships... but Hermione Granger would have invited Menelaus to tea, and then sent him home again smiling, with perhaps a few arranged marriages to seal the deal. Merlin, she's scary._

 _"Join us." Hermione said, her voice final, "And tell me, what do you think about your sister?"_

"It's not my sister you need to worry about," Narcissa Black-Malfoy said, sitting and taking a sip of tea, "It's the Longbottom's boy, and Augusta."  
"You'd begrudge them their just revenge?" Hermione said sharply.  
"Only if it proves unnecessary. I prefer justice above vengeance, it tends to lead to fewer blood feuds."  
"Blutgeld?" Hermione volleyed back.  
Eyes sparkling like black ice, Draco suddenly cut in, "She's got a backup plan!"  
Narcissa smiled coldly, "My sister would be a fool not to do so. She may at the moment be mad, but she's no fool."  
"What's her backup plan, and why is it important?" Hermione asked carefully, trying not to sound terribly querulous.

"I think..." Draco said, swallowing suddenly before continuing in a calm voice, "She can fix Neville's parents."

"Or kill them," Narcissa said with a wintry smile, "I think she'll give Longbottom the option. If she believes the Dark Lord dead, truly and always, that is."

"Why would she give him the option of having her kill them?" Hermione asked, her face turning all frowny from the very thought.

"They're burdens, and this way the Longbottoms would be rid of them. 'Save' them and she can't guarantee much more than they'll no longer be unresponsive. They might be obsessives, or prone to bouts of mania and depression. She locked them inside themselves, for years. Can't guarantee they're still sane, or even fixable." Draco Malfoy said, his voice even and unruffled, though he knew his mother would notice his fear. It was one thing to think about being killed, even tortured and killed. But spending that long with only yourself for company... that was a unique form of torture.

"I think Neville can be persuaded to at least listen to Bellatrix, particularly if she's not trying to shoot his head off. Harry's another story." Hermione said, her last three words delivered with precise, cutting force.

[a/n: okay, this time it's Narcissa pulling the "cut story here" lever. Read and Review, lads and ladies!]


	9. Why Potter?

"Harry Potter?" Draco Malfoy asked, his mind reaching back, trying to pull forth something, anything to latch onto.

"My sister didn't kill _his_ parents." Narcissa said, her normally silvery voice briefly retaining a trace of the timbre the Blacks were known for. Her face folded into a moue, not wanting to think on that.

"Close enough. She killed his godfather, Sirius Black. While cackling louder than a banshee, I might add." Granger's voice was cold

"No justice for that, I'm afraid," Draco said gravely. "Still, we were discussing the people we ought to murder preemptively. If you're willing to take Bellatrix off the list... well, a war is a war." At this Draco smirked, "I can't say I have been overly fond of the madwoman, aunt or no." Softly and gracefully, Narcissa nodded as well, before taking a sip of tea.

"She's a curious choice for someone you can 'trust', isn't she?" Granger asked.

"Predictable is the watchword, not trust." Since when do Slytherins trust anyone? Draco thought wryly. "In this case, she makes admirable cannon fodder. As would Moody, should the converse arise."

"You just plan to drop them into the heat of battle?" Granger demanded, her voice implying hands on her hips that didn't exist... quite yet, at least.

"They're most effective there. Can't order either of them, or ensure compliance in any other shape or form. They're both a bit mad, you know." Draco said, almost idly. As usual, his facade was an effective artifice - an edifice carved in stone, keeping his private thoughts walled well back from prying eyes.

"I... think," Granger blinked, swallowed, and continued, "I hope I can talk Harry out of killing Bellatrix in cold blood." With a chill in her heart, Granger looked over at the rest of the Dark contingent, her eyes nearly instantly finding the abyssal depths of the person who she _knew_ she wouldn't be able to talk Harry out of murdering.

[a/n: I lied! Sorry, this was another cliffie too good to lose (izzit apparent who I'm talking about?). I know, I'm addicted. OTOH, I write quickly! Show some love and write a review!

Up next: they'll finally finish discussing the plan. I hope. ]


	10. Hawk Eyes sharper than spite

Nodding once at both of them, Hermione Granger set back to work on the rest of the pile, her mind swiftly lost to anything but the magnetic words on the page. It was very well organized, this list, and painful care had been taken to be both concise and descriptive. There was both ample evidence and persuasive reasoning for the danger that these would continue to pose, after the war was over.

Sipping gently at some tea, Malfoy eyes rested gently upon Miss Granger. Unbeknownst to her, with every folder that she turned, Draco Malfoy's tension increased. No longer did he look like Peter Pan, magical and happy in a sparkling world. Instead, he looked like Oliver Twist, with nerves wound ever tighter, his muscles tensing with each page turned. Waiting for this all to go wrong. He wasn't sure what he was going to do, if it did - it depended on her reaction, of course. His muscles relaxed, slightly, as he rifled through ten different plans in his head, _checking and rechecking plans that would do no good if they were needed_ , he thought grimly. _This was my best shot_ , he thought; _but don't think for a moment I won't take another, if needed_. _The question, as always, was what to aim for. As a child, all he had wanted was his father's pride. Now, now that seemed foolhardy in the extreme. He knew his father better now, and the best way to get recognition from the man was pulling the rug out from under him. Far be it from Draco to be that petty, of course, but petty vengeance was still vengeance to be savored. As a teenager, he had wanted nothing more than to wipe those smug grins, erase those sanctimonious words off the Gryffindors' faces. It had been a balm to him, as he felt himself slipping into the abyssal dark. Now? Well, if he were a Goyle, or a Crabbe - a Weasel or a Granger, he'd simply run. He wanted out, Draco thought - the well-worn realization still ringing with the solidity of truth. But everyone knew that Malfoys didn't run - and at any rate, being Bound to the Dark Lord would make running rather difficult, though surely not impossible._

 _"_ Podmore too," Granger muttered, as she continued to look through Draco Malfoy's notes. The Death Eater names were known to her, one and all. Few were subtle in their lunacy or sadism, after all. An unleashed dog was little to be feared, but a pack could bring down a reindeer. The ones on her side, though, were painful, each and all.

Granger stiffened, as she came to the file on Tonks -one of her few girl friends in the Order. But Tonks had traces of the Black temper,and it looked like she was taking it out on the prisoners. _Even the Carrows didn't deserve to be bound and tortured_ , Granger thought indignantly. "I think Nymphadora might need some lessons, more than she needs to be taken out of the gene pool..."

Narcissa chimed in sweetly, "What did lessons ever do for Bellatrix, other than make her contrary and even more mean-spirited? It is difficult to contain a Black in the first place, and nearly impossible if they don't want it themselves. Unlike Bella, Nymphadora's unlikely to be swayed by love, as it wasn't her motivation in the first place."

Hermione looked straight on at Narcissa as she lifted her cup slowly, asking, "Vengeance?"

Draco nodded sharply and said, "Vengeance precisely. Or imprecisely, in her case. It wouldn't matter if it was just known troublemakers from the other side - I couldn't care a whit if someone murders Dolokov "accidentally on purpose". But she's been after harmless housewives." And Draco Malfoy broke off, noting the icy glare of his mother from across the table. Feeling like a child again, he fought the urge to duck, and then bolt from the room. _There are no exits, where would I go?_

Hermione Granger flipped over the second to last folder, opening the last one as Draco Malfoy deliberately loosened his mucles, one by one. "Molly Weasley," Hermione Granger ground out, her voice cold as ice.

And then she began to read.

[a/n: Did anyone guess that? Draco certainly didn't - he was expecting fireworks as soon as Granger saw the name!

Reminder: the limited third person narrator knows more than Draco...

Please comment and review, in the next chapter I hope to give you some Snape!]


	11. Molly Weasley, the Phoenix's Citron

Hermione Granger was reading every single page of that document, her face frozen in stony silence. _Of course she was, what did you expect? She's not going to make a judgement before finishing the whole thing..._ About halfway through, her shoulders started to shake, and her eyes had turned bleak. "All this behind everyone's backs?" she whispered, the cave taking the words and making them louder. _The weasley matron was practically a mother to all three of them..._ "And it's getting worse..." she said, turning the twentieth page, each one describing a murder of one Death Eater or another. _They'd all have believed it if it was my mum... or Zambini's, the clever little liar. Found a way to protect his mum, and fiddled the hell out of it. Fat lot of good it did either of them, with war cresting the horizon_. As the last page ended, and Hermione Granger closed the file, she shut her eyes. Draco Malfoy wasn't known for being a patient person, but he forced himself to wait, to _bide his time_ like a good boy.

When next she spoke, it was a loud whisper, "There's no chance of figuring out who killed her brothers?"

Draco Malfoy scoffed, and said, "After over a decade? Unlikely at best... and she won't stop until she finds them."

Hermione Granger's mouth had hardened into a thin line. "I can see why you didn't want to tell Ron or Harry about this." _No, you can't._

Draco forced himself to stillness, looking almost indifferently at the tears pooling in Granger's eyes. All an illusion, of course, a cunning facsimile of what he had been trained to present himself as. His mother knew, he could tell without looking; few others might even notice any change.

 _What was she thinking?_ Draco Malfoy asked himself, wondering what wild ideas were running through her head.

Hermione Granger closed her eyes again, two tears spilling out as if by accident. The glistening tear-tracks down her cheeks seemed nearly a betrayal of her fortitude. Hermione Granger leaned backward, her shoulders taking on the set of a sergeants, her head held proudly upward. "Can't be helped, can it?" she asked roughly. In her pure practicality of expression, Draco Malfoy saw the shade of Professor McGonagall. _There could be worse people to imitate,_ he thought wryly, _Like Professor Moody - real or fake._

"If it could, she wouldn't be on the list." Draco agreed.

"You should have a second list, you know." Hermione Granger began, pausing briefly.

"A second list?" Draco echoed, waiting for her idea.

"The persuadables. The people who are trouble, mean trouble, but we could get them to stop. And the people who might be trouble, and might not be, after the war is over. People who go over the line once deserve to be watched, not ruined... or killed."

Draco nodded, saying, "You may be right about that one. It'll be too risky for us to meet again, though, so use your judgement - and we'll keep two lists."

"If... if you find enough evidence, as good evidence as the stuff here, you should act on it. Don't wait for the war to be over, by then, it'll be too late." Hermione opined, her face looking sick. "I don't like it, but I think you're right. Bend the rules once, that's one thing. But bend them twice, and you start to get used to bending them..."

Draco nodded, and Hermione Granger fell silent for a moment. _Thinking things through, trying to decide about everything at once, no doubt._ "I'll provisionally accept your plans for the aftermath." _How unlike a Gryffindor, to avoid jumping in head over heels._ Hermione leaned forward, and asked, "Now what do you have about Voldemort?"

Continuing to lean back, in his position of studied nonchalance, Draco Malfoy smiled and pulled an ornate key from his pocket. "This leads to the Malfoy Library. When Voldemort was learning the dark arts, he primarily studied in the Malfoy and the Black libraries. We kept a log of what he read, as we do for all visitors. With a bit of luck, you might figure out what he's done, and how to... reverse it."

Hermione Granger's eyes had gleamed for a moment with greed at the mention of a library - let alone a presitigious library like the Malfoy's. "How... is that... safe?" She sputtered, her eyes sharp and searching.

"Nothing is safe in a war" Draco drawled, "But you'll have nothing to fear from me, and as you can see, my mother is on my side."

Hermione shot a sharp glance at his mum, who returned the look with a grave and graceful nod.

"My father will be unlikely to visit, attending so closely as he does on the Dark Lord. And, if he does, I have a contingency plan."

"As do I," Narcissa Malfoy cut in smoothly.

"Explain." Hermione Granger said, crossing her arms.

"I think you'd make a quite lovely house elf, with the proper application of polyjuice. Of course, you'd have to be naked, but Muggles should be used to that." Narcissa said smoothly, her insults delivered with an offhand nonchalance that made it difficult to take offense.

But, as Draco Malfoy well knew, difficult was not impossible, and leave it to Granger to be difficult, after all. "I beg your pardon!" Granger spat, before grinning and saying in a voice that twisted like a galed windsock, "Or perhaps you ought to be begging my pardon. I'd be happy to remedy your ignorance, but at the moment it would be quite awkward. Another time, I suppose."

"Indeed" Narcissa said, her voice and mien reflecting neither affront nor approval nor anything at all. When Narcissa wanted, she could be the perfect mirror. It was a wonderful cover for awkwardness, either her own or other people's, even if it did come across a bit chilly.

Draco cut in, "I have a few... diversions that might interest the Dark Lord more than residing at Malfoy Manor. Likewise, my father is easily distracted." his mouth twisted at the words, as they belied the grimness of the actual plan. But, after all, it wasn't him doing the torturing. And they'd do it regardless, if not to the same people. Keeping people like plucked chickens, ready to chop their heads off if needed was a vile thing to do. The good of the many outweighs the good of the few, he repeated, the catechism coming as if by rote, and repeated as woodenly and as faithfully as any monk might.

Uncrossing her arms, Granger said simply, "I might have guessed you wouldn't have much to offer in the short term. If it was going to be easy, you'd have done it yourself and me none the wiser." Draco nodded at the assertion, as it was fundamentally true. Why would he want to share the glory with a Gryffindor if it wasn't necessary? "Still, it's a better deal than nothing at all, even if it is weak broth."

[a/n: apparently I didn't explain why everyone was here. Didja forget about 'em? Read and review, please - and post guesses on why there's so many people here, frozen like a crystal in time].


	12. Tying Up Loose Ends

Hermione Granger looked at Draco Malfoy, and asked a question that had snuck up on her so quietly she hadn't realized it was even there, until that very moment. "Why did you collect so many people?"

Draco's smooth drawl emerged, saying, "If we actually want to get the drop on the people there." his head pointed at the dossier, "We're going to need soldiers, not just two generals conversing over tea, however pleasant that might be." the acidity of his tone had shades of Snape in it, the direct insinuation that tea was absolutely the last thing he wanted to be doing right now.

"And you trust them?" Granger asked, her sharp eyes scrutinizing his every motion.

"Hardly. But they've given me their word, and they'll not break it lightly. I've got more hanging over most of their heads than you'd believe." Granger looked skeptical. "What did you think Death Eaters did for fun? Have tea parties?" The last sentence came out rather rougher than Malfoy had meant it to.

"Oh, no, not tea parties. Maybe the odd Dark Revel or two. Or muggle hunting." Hermione Granger's eyes were serious, there wasn't a sparkle of amusement to them.

"I prefer more intellectual pursuits, and finding a person's greatest weakness has always been a particular pleasure of mine." His tone was deliberately light, and the conversation moreso - distracting, as a Slytherin often will, from more serious subjects.

Granger snorted and said, "I'll just bet. Alright, what's my greatest weakness? Or, better yet, what's Harry's?"

Malfoy stood, walking away three paces, and then coming back, leaning on the back of his chair. "Harry's greatest weakness is his impulsivity. That, combined with his courage, stands even odds of getting him killed, no matter the day or time." Malfoy smirked.

"And me?" Granger looked at him levely, trying to decide if he actually knew what he was talking about. _Of course I do..._

"As to you, I haven't decided what your _greatest_ weakness is, you have so many." _Oh, but I'd love the look on her face if I presumed to suggest that her greatest weakness was me._ "If I had to distract you, I'd use your curiosity - it's as much a weakness as a strength, and you know it as well as I do."

The look in Granger's eyes was wry, briefly, before she sobered. "If I agree to this, you expect us to brief them together?"

"No, of course not. Half the Slytherins would kill you on sight, and I'm not just talking about the Death Eaters." Malfoy scoffed.

"You think Tori would kill me on sight?!" Granger squeaked, her voice not tight from fear, but from a curious mixture of anger and utter flabbergastedness.

"She'd be right to, you know. What are the odds that Hermione Granger would whisk her away from a battle against the Dark?"

It sounded like it killed her to admit it, but Hermione did in fact grind out, "I suppose you're right. Nevertheless, we're both going to have to talk with Headmaster Snape. I have a few questions for him in particular."

Eyes wide, Draco Malfoy inspected Hermione Granger like she was madness personified, Megaera the Avenging Fury, driven mad by vengeance. "Did I, or did I not, just tell you of the propensity for Slytherins to take your presence here as evidence of Polyjuice, or some other nefarious purpose? _Whyever_ would you want to talk to Severus, of all people? He's paranoid on the best of days, and I can assure you, this won't be counted among those."

"The Headmaster has exceedingly sharp ears, and keen eyes, Mister Malfoy. I can assure you accounts of my exploits have not failed to reach them." _Exploits? Why that puffed up piece of skirt... Bloody annoying wench._ "Besides, isn't he always praising the caution and subtlety of the Slytherins? If I can think of a way to douse him with enough water that he reacts like a drowned rat, surely you can do similar."

"Of course I can." _Though I haven't thought up a scrap of an idea._ _ **Why**_ _does she want to talk with Severus?_

Narcissa Malfoy spoke up gently, "Perhaps you are right, Miss Granger. I think Master Snape, of all people, is likely to need more assurance in order to sign onto this plan."

Draco Malfoy shot his mother a look that said, as clear as speech, _we already talked about this, and made our decision._ "He's my godfather. Why wouldn't he help me?"

"I can think of half a hundred reasons," Hermione cut in, her tone venomous. "Trouble is, a third of them are lies, and I'm not sure which ones those are."

Narcissa Malfoy smiled a small, sweet smile, "Hence the questions, I suppose?" Granger simply nodded.

"I haven't made up my mind, just yet, but the Headmaster is as brilliant as he is cunning. If there's holes in your plan, it's more than a fair shot he'll spot 'em." Granger said, and Malfoy had to concede that she had a point. And he'd really rather she didn't sign up for something _fatally flawed_.

[Reviews make me happy. Happy me posts more. Up next: how exactly do you wake a wrathful Severus? Very carefully. Comment with your best idea, please!

I do hold that putting Severus Snape into any fanfic livens up the piece, just like adding lemon to an apple pie.]


	13. Defusing the Snape

_Sigh. She's not going to stop arguing until I give in, is she? Questions of all things... does she really think she can get a damned thing out of Severus Snape?_ Draco restrained himself from shaking his head. _Out of sheer dogged determination, and pure puissance, perhaps, at that._ Quietly, almost to himself, Draco Malfoy muttered, "This is a horrible idea..." _Granger's eyes sparkled defiantly, that sure arrogance of the simple self-righteous. I wish I could steal some of that for myself. It's been years since I knew anything concrete, let alone the right thing to do. Granted, half the time I had known the right thing, and had done else out of sheer spite - so there is that, I suppose._ "Okay, we do this my way - and that's carefully. First, we're going to have to move him away from the others, lest he set Aunt Bellatrix free..." _Only by accident, I'm sure. Even Severus Snape would find her more pleasant - and useful - as a frozen lump of meat._

"Stand here, beside me." Draco Malfoy ordered Granger, his crisp tone a far cry from his general drawl. "Chin up, and wand hidden. Show of force, and be prepared for nothing, but above all else, don't let him see you afraid. He's not a teacher, not here. He's a dangerous warrior, and we're his superiors."

"Mother, you're on defense. He tries anything that's out of line, shield us. Stay hidden, and, if you can, be three wands, not one." Narcissa Malfoy peeked out from behind a stalagmite, and gave a brief smile, before ducking behind it again. In her svelte blondness, she resembled Luna Lovegood, if her eyes were impossibly sharp, rather than dreamy and bedazzled.

"Deep breath, and then let's roll." As one, Malfoy and Granger breathed in, held it for a moment, and then exhaled. Narcissa cast the spell to revive Snape - and then a funny thing happened.

Severus Snape woke with sightless eyes, his body seeming to collapse like rubber. Both Granger and Malfoy were veterans of Snape's training, had seen him in battles and at Quiddich games, saving children from Longbottom's hazards and stalking the corridors shooting Unforgivables from the tip of his wand. Only Narcissa Malfoy understood Snape in that instant, her mouth quirking just slightly from the recognition. Granger and Malfoy merely had the glimpse of an entire new puzzle (or was it three) underlaying the Snape they thought they knew.

The moment passed, as Snape fell to the floor, his lanky, angular grace turning it into a rustle of robes, as he rolled swiftly to the nearest shelter (a stalagmite). His back toward it, and seeing no one, he shouted a minor counter to invisibility. Trying to keep an everwatchful eye, he glanced behind the stalagmite, and sighted Granger and Malfoy. In a trice, he had them both in bodybinds, his roving eyes more focused on his surroundings than on their behavior. Draco Malfoy smiled inwardly, _how like him, never one to leave anything to chance._

A minute passed before Severus Snape looked at the two again. Draco caught the instant of recognition, the understanding of the play in his old teacher's eyes, before they disappeared behind the dripstone.

Moments later, Severus Snape appeared out from behind the shieldstone, standing as tall and as unruffled as Draco Malfoy had ever seen him. _Washing your paw, Severus? Pity you're not fool enough to release us from these bodybinds - they're deuced uncomfortable! Play the part, and act it well,_ Draco reminded himself sternly.

In his professorial purr, Severus Snape paced towards them, asking sharply, "Who wants to tell me what in blue blazes is going on?" _Every movement screams paranoia, and yet he's acting as if he's in control, not expecting trouble from all quarters._ "And who the bloody hell is Polyjuiced as Draco Malfoy?" _Why did Granger always, always have to be right?_

[a/n: in all fairness, Draco Malfoy could simply have _asked_ to see Severus. Being bound and whisked out of battle isn't necessary _or_ sufficient.

Rule Number One about waking up the Snape after kidnapping him from the middle of a battle: _Face him away from you._

Read and review, this is your last chapter to pull together some of the pieces (see the blurb for the story) before I reveal them, so you might want to read over the whole again, and see what you've missed. Hard to believe all this for a oneshot, ain't it? So if you've got guesses, throw 'em out! (I even put a few hints into this chapter, just for you!) ]


	14. The rasp of Snape's tongue

In a soft voice pitched to carry (like Professor Snape's had always in class), Draco Malfoy replied, "You always did like your asparagus, Severus Snape."

"No more so than you." Snape shot back, the lack of good humor like a flashing knife leaping out of a dark alley. "Potter, what did you do to Draco Malfoy?" Snape snapped.

Draco's jaw fell agape, momentarily baffled, as he saw Hermione start to open her mouth, her eyes flashing in a fit of pique. _Blast it all, be quiet!_ Malfoy silently willed the girl beside him.

Smoothly, gracefully, Narcissa Malfoy's unruffled voice slid out from behind the stalagmite, saying, "You are speaking to my son, Severus." As if she had not just a moment before had her wand trained on Severus, she traipsed into view, her movements the epitome of dignity and self-respect.

If Draco hadn't been watching closely, he'd have missed the slight relaxation of Severus Snape, the sliding from someone ready for all-out war into his classroom persona, which only _looked_ like it was ready for a bloodbath.

"I'd better explain." Draco Malfoy hastened to say, his voice still that smooth, unhurried drawl. It was better _not_ to test Snape's patience, never overlong even in the best of times.

"Yes, you had." Snape trained those glittering onyx eyes of his on his former pupil, before commanding, "First, tell me what I've missed, and how long I've been out."

Narcissa twitched her wand, and the disillusion spell fell off the frozen people behind the Potion Master. Draco wryly nodded acknowledgement at his mother (being bound hand and foot and everything inbetween was the very devil on casting spells - good thing he needn't cast his own).

"Turn around and see for yourself, " Draco said, knowing that his godfather's sharp gaze wouldn't miss much. The slight widening of Snape's eyes as he turned around was gratification enough. It was rare indeed to surprise a capable Slytherin, and particularly one that knew the Malfoys' so well.

"Your doing, I suppose." Snape looked back at Draco.

"Indeed." And Draco filed the inconvenient thought _he seems so sure of that, does he?_

"Why?"

"War makes a wonderful excuse for things best not done under the sun, does it not?"

"Yes, indeed it does... What do you have planned?"

And Draco Malfoy explained, in a far shorter amount of time than it had taken to explain it to Hermione Granger. Snape listened as patiently as he was wont, his questions as sharp as his angular elbows, and thrown just as mercilessly as if they were in a fight. Weaknesses exposed, strengths sundered, and, nearly always, a deft, clever idea slithering through the break. It was not without surprise that Draco Malfoy greeted Snape's latest suggestion, however - there was always a fine line between brilliant and plain daft, and for a moment, he thought the old man had crossed it.

"Percy Weasley? Why would I ever involve one of the Weasels? They come as a matched set, you know that..."

"He's had a bit of a falling out with the rest of the family, or so I've been told." Snape growled, and Hermione confirmed with a quick nod. "He's your man if you need the people who haven't had a bit of the fighting, yet care enough to help you out."

"It's true, he's one of the Gryffindors I'd trust to find justice, first and always." Hermione Granger piped in, her voice considering...

"You think he's got spine enough to kill?"

"And then some, but he's more likely to find a deep dark _unspeakable_ hole for some of those on your list." Snape pointed out, his tone fairly purring.

"Just so they don't come crawling back."

"They won't," and the wolfish smile on Snape's face was unmistakable. _So that's Snape's man in the ministry, is it? Snape'll get the job done, he's never failed before..._

"Here's the full list," Draco Malfoy said gravely, handing a stack of papers as big as the unabridged OED to Snape. The professor's practiced eyes made short work of the pile in front of him, mostly reading only the first page, often only the name. _It made sense, Snape's got ears behind everyone else's eyes, and he liked to know people... personally._

"You haven't figured out who killed her brothers, have you?" Granger asked, as Snape came to the last folder.

"Not in nearly twenty years of searching, no. Frankly, I think whomever did it is dead, in mind or body." Snape said. _Azkhaban, in other words, like the more devout of the Dark Lord's followers._

"What have you been up to, Severus Snape? It's been a while since we've _caught up_ to one another..." Granger asked, and Draco fought to keep himself from startling. _**That** was the voice of a general, no Jean d' Arc, no McGonagall... if anything, it was Snape's own voice reflected... The stubborn tilt of her head almost obscured the slyness of her words, the stiletto at-the-ready concealed inside a chain gauntlet._

"Orders, always orders." Snape responded, his voice strangely light in its careworn heaviness, its weariness somehow more honest than Snape's usual silky purr. He tossed his head, his fine hair falling out of his eyes so he could meet Granger's eyes directly. But, _during_ that practiced movement, his craggy chin had pointed towards Draco Malfoy.

Granger's gaze if anything sharpened, nearly glaring at Snape for a moment - _no, evaluating_ \- before she nodded. Draco nearly had to sit on his own sense of curiosity to get it to stay put. _Not now,_ he irritably snapped at himself, _later_.

"Is that it, Draco, is that your plan?" Snape snapped, his voice crisp as the colors snapping against a Scotch breeze.

"Yes, professor, it is."

"I've never heard such a Gryffindorish plan in my entire life! I hope you have a sound explanation for this!" Snape's anger felt like the teeth of the wind, ready to strip Draco of skin, and muscle, down to the very bone. Yet Draco found himself relaxing. _If there had been anything **really** wrong with it, he'd have mentioned that **first**. _ Unwanted, unasked-for, a blush crept up Draco Malfoy's features, as he himself began to notice just exactly how Gryffindor this plan was... what he had _already_ done...

[a/n: Read and Review! Can anyone guess Draco's secret?

An outtake from this chapter had Snape asking if the Dark Lord was finally dead, having failed to come up with any other reason why Malfoy and Granger would be standing together...

Yes, by the end of this, both Granger and Malfoy are still bound. Snape hasn't seen reason to loosen them, and they're being quite reasonably stubborn about holding their ground. Needing to be untied, not seeming comfortable and in _control_ , would be a needless mistake.]


	15. A Private Matter

Raising an eyebrow, Snape simply asked, "Really?" in that distinctive purr of his. _Typical reaction, stalling for time, considering what I've got in store for him. Of course, it's all wrong, he couldn't_ _ **possibly**_ _get this one._

"Yes, now if you'll step with me over here, we can have a modicum of privacy." Draco Malfoy said, his voice trailing behind him, as he led his former professor over to the side of the vaulted cavern. Draco's mien suggested expected compliance, so he didn't spare a glance back until he where he intended to be. Then he gracefully turned towards his professor, who had followed with his usual silent grace, and cast a basic privacy spell.

"Allow me." Snape said crisply, as he expertly spun out a different auditory charm, layering it just beneath Draco's spell. Then Snape cast a mild mirage spell, which should make the onlookers see mild visual hallucinations and distortions. Finally, Snape cast an olfactory spell. Delicately and subtly, Draco inhaled, thinking _Pine needles and crisp autumnal air, somehow not what I'd associate with our grim potions master. Perhaps that's the point, though?_ Snape nodded and said, "Proceed."

Draco calmly glanced at Narcissa, as his mother tried vainly to engage Granger in conversation - _Idle chitchat, or more meddling, mother dearest? Not_ _that it matters, she's not going to hear a dashed thing you say._ His eyes returning to his former professor, Draco pulled out a stoppered vial, and passed it to his former potions professor, who nearly dropped it in disbelief. Not that his face showed a bloody thing, of course, other than a brief widening of the eyes, and a terse compression of his mouth.

"Her?!" Snape asked, his face schooled to an illusion of imperturbability.

Draco nodded, quoting briefly, "If you cannot trust your allies, at least predict them well." It was Snape's own words of advice about befriending Greg and Vince, rather than Zambini or Nott. From the subtle flaring of Snape's nostrils, Draco knew that he remembered, and that Draco had scored a minor point.

"Surely this wasn't your blinkered idea?!" Snape snapped, his voice retreating into a rumble that portended an avalanche of rage.

"No, of course not!" Draco snapped back, "It was my _beloved_ aunt's, if you must know. And no amount of pouting, whining, whinging or evading her would put her off it," which Snape well knew, of course. No one _really_ tried to stop Bella Black when she was on a tear.

"How did you know it was her?" Snape asked, his curiosity truly getting the better of him.

Draco slyly smirked, "Yule Ball - not that I was dancing with her." Draco scoffed, his sharp eyes glinting as he continued, "She was looking down at the festivities, and I had just stepped outside for some fresh air. We met, greeted each other, and I went down to dance with Pansy again."

Snape sighed, looked down at his feet for a moment, and then looked up at Draco Malfoy, weariness clouding his vision for barely a moment. "I have seen many awesome and weird things in my unlamented life, but this is the first time in simply ages that I find myself astounded."

"I know," Draco Malfoy said softly.

And then Snape's eyes gleamed, malevolent mischief rising in them faster than a tornado's passing, "Oh, but think of the possibilities!"

"You won't tell her." Draco said flatly, his words casting a gauntlet down. Not what a younger version of him could have said - a question, a challenge, but not the bare, cold iron statement, _don't cross me on this._

"Oh, no," Snape purred, his mouth quirking into a genuine smile his dark eyes mirrored in a twisted, malevolent way, "Wouldn't want to spoil the surprise." And that was Snape, ladies and gentlemen, determined to exploit the _entire_ situation to the utmost. Draco Malfoy had expected no less.

"Thank you." Draco Malfoy said in his archly aristocratic tone.

"You're certain of your course of action? It's more than a bit of a gamble." Snape asked, his concern nearly catlike, as he placed two parallel lines of thought in the same sentence.

"I am." Draco said, his low voice firm and steady.

"Then we'd better rejoin the others, before Granger decides your mother is in need of a hexing."

"I'd like to see her try." Draco Malfoy shot back, and they strode back towards the sparring pair of women.

[a/n: Comments, criticism? Write a review, silly ducks!

I'm surprised it took me over 10,000 words to get to this reveal. Do you like it? It drove me perfectly crazy, the idea that people's soulmate wouldn't be their unique, personal (pheromonic) scent, but merely the scents they wore. That seems silly, doesn't the wizarding world have perfume shops? Be glad that it wasn't a woman taking this potion, either - guys' scents echo beneath the manly odor of sweat (which smells like a teenage locker room). Stinky!

Nobody managed to guess this reveal, either! I thought it was pretty obvious, myself... have fun rereading to find the clues, they're scattered simply everywhere!

To the _adorably_ stupid person who decided to ask if I was trolling, _of course_ I am! It's a good, inspired rethink of another person's idea, with just a dash of mockery.

Remember, third person limited doesn't mean you get to know everything that Draco knows, just what he's thinking about at the moment...]


	16. Glittering Eyes

Draco Malfoy nurses a quiet smile that he hides beneath his customary nonchalance - himself unaware of how his eyes sparkle strangely like Dumbledore's. _Snape's a right bastard, but he's a_ _ **Slytherin**_ _sort of bastard, and that means he's not like to spill a secret when he can make a knut off it himself. 'Sides, the canny bastard's welcome to figure this one out, it's been worrying my bones long enough that they ache._

"Anything else that needs to be said?" Snape asks, his manner just as brusque as if they stood in his potions classrom, and hadn't just been discussing mindbending alterations in reality.

"Not that I know of; and you'd better be going before Harry gets here. I can't stand for the consequences of the two of you in the same room today." Granger retorted tartly in a manner oddly reminiscent of Minerva McGonagall. Draco Malfoy glanced, no, glared at Granger, agog at the very idea of Harry Potter setting one ruddy foot into this cavern. Why hadn't she discussed this? Scratch that, why in blithering hell was she mentioning it to Snape, of all people! All she had to do was tell him "nothing else, sir" and let him leave, which Snape'd be quite happy to do. His machinations had been put on hold for long enough, after all... What the _hell_ was she doing?

"Oh, no, I'd hate to miss the show." If Severus Snape knew how to smile, he'd be doing so right now, Draco Malfoy swore. As it was, the man's mouth curled into a vicious grin, displaying far too many teeth. "You're asking me to leave, and leaving Bellatrix Black behind? How very kind of you. Shall we be adding another Black to the list of people Potter has murdered?" Draco shot a keen eye at Snape, his face almost curling into a smirk. _Nice of the old chap, to do the convincing for me._

"Bellatrix Black is rather easily hidden, frozen as she is. It's rather harder to contain you, moving target that you are." Granger shot back, her voice placid and cold. "Besides, Narcissa has this mad idea that her sister can fetch Frank and Alice back through the rabbithole." _Through the rabbithole? Oh, Longbottom's parents, out of the mind-warren Crucio dug for them._

"I wouldn't put anything past such a formidable witch. Convincing her to employ herself for the good of blood traitors, though, I find most improbable."

"Not after the dark lord is dead." Granger said, forthrightly - and Draco's quick eyes saw a momentary darkening of Snape's eyes. _What was that about?_ Draco thought quickly, pulling his mind back to the conversation nearly instantly.

"There is that, I suppose." Snape said quietly.

"You've no expiation for Dumbledore's murder, have you?" Granger looked into Snape's black eyes, for what, exactly, it was impossible to tell, only that she was truly focused on his next words.

"Only orders." Snape said softly, his voice nearly a growl. Suddenly, he spun around, his robes whipping out, as he shouted back at them, "Orders, orders and more orders!"

With drawn upon icy hauter, Granger nodded once, and said coldly, "I'll pass it on. Now _leave_." It was no longer the pupil talking to her professor, but a general giving an order that was to be obeyed.

Snape, for once wordless - if his eyes howled icy hatred, he wasn't sharing the cause - Apparated away.

Leaving three people with one thought echoing between their heads, _**Three** sets of orders?_

[a/n: anyone who wants to carp about Draco swearing using _Muggle_ swears? He once was a young boy with a rather keen habit of eavesdropping. And Severus Snape swears, _rather a lot_ , when he's not in school. Draco, as a subtler than usual child, internalized what was a _bad_ word, and doesn't use it _out loud_.

Write Reviews! Is it apparent why Granger wants to bring Potter here?]


	17. Bareknuckle Brawling, not Fisticuffs

Alone, except for his mother, Draco Malfoy turned to Granger, his eyes burning fiercely as he smiled an icy smile, "So, you want to bring Potter _here_? Whyever for?"

"It'll help if both Harry and Ron are listening, well and good, to what I've got to say." Granger said, "And if I come back from here with just what you've told me, they'll badger me with questions, and won't get a single thing through their thick skulls."

 _She's probably right._ "Temper, temper - they're your friends, not mine."

"That's why I get to say the truth, and you don't."

"So I'm only allowed to twist everything into a lie?" Malfoy asks, his lips twitching into a rather wicked smirk.

"That is what an enemy would do, isn't it? If you don't want to fit _in_ a box, kindly stop digging your claws into it in a vain attempt to avoid being pulled out." _You can certainly tell she owns a cantankerous cat, can't you?_

"You really think they'd listen? To Draco Malfoy, the evil Prince of Slytherin." Draco's mouth twists into some semblance of a wry smile, entirely undoing what he had been saying, at least in terms of malice directed to _her_. "

"They'll listen to me. They'll question you. It doesn't really matter whether they agree now or not, they will."

"Then why bother inviting them in the first place?"

"Because, as I was just saying, if I don't, it'll take longer for them to listen and believe me!"

"Define longer."

"Months." Granger's voice echoes with a certainty that is rather alarming, to be perfectly frank. _Months? What sort of friends are they?! At least Crabbe and Goyle knew when to sit down and follow sensible orders._

"What a bother." Draco's voice sounds unruffled, but his body is tense again, as he leans backward. "Potter, I understand - but why Weasley? Has he ever reacted rationally to anything?"

"If we don't invite Ron, he'll _sulk_. And we don't have time for a year-long sulk. _Again_." Granger paused, took a deep breath, and said, "And Harry'll be easier to convince if Ron's going off the deep end."

"Gotta be strong for his special little friend, eh?" Draco's voice has regained a lot of the ill-tempered, spiteful humor

In a purely unruffled tone, nearly reminiscent of Pomfrey, but a bit more motherly, Granger said, "Yes, dear, let it all out. You shan't say a word like that while they're here, Is that understood?" _How the hell does she **do** that? _ Malfoy thought, shooting a venomous glare in her direction. _My mother has never sounded like that, never!_

"Crystal clear." Draco Malfoy says, understanding, nearly despite himself, that he does actually need to make an effort. "I just hope you're sure about this..." Malfoy grumbles, knowing that Granger doesn't speak unless she's sure. And that means that Pothead and Weasel are coming. Joy.

[a/n: Read and Review, folks! I do write faster that way, I promise. And I'm gratified for the 15+ folks who read the whole way through in the past week. Finally the story's at about the stage where you can get a good bit of meat out of it! Exciting!]


	18. Enter the Dynamic Duo!

Granger and Malfoy put their heads together, quickly devising a plan - which was mostly about casting invisibility on the two groups of frozen people. No need to worry the two, after all. Turns out Granger had a foolproof way to contact the boys, as she _insisted_ on calling them. "

Malfoy shook his head grimly as he sat down, muttering under his breath, "I've got a bad feeling about this..."

"Everything will go fine. Just keep your head." Granger said, sitting at a precise 90 degrees away from Malfoy, facing the open part of the cavern where Pothead and Weasel were due to arrive. _Easy for her to say,_ Draco thought. Granger muttered something to herself, too quiet to hear. "They'll be along in five minutes, unless they get lost." _I'd place bets on them getting lost, myself._ "In which case, give them eight."

And they were both alone with their thoughts, sitting quietly (Narcissa had returned to the fire, and would otherwise play the role of Watchhound if necessary). Not that Draco was strictly alone with his thoughts, as he sifted through the conversation with Severus Snape, his mental muscles replaying the entire scene as if he was seeing it for the first time. _Hmm... that's funny. Why'd he think Pothead could have possibly known that...? Unless...?_ Draco's mind raced on, paging through the conversation and flagging puzzles and words of interest, his mind coming to rest like a hummingbird on _those three sets of orders_. Draco nearly bit his lip, thinking, _Stop,_ _ **now**_ _. Not another thought, think of something else._ With a glance at Granger, he began to think of her breasts, nearly translucently pale under his fingers, feeling her nipples stiffen under his thumbs.

As his groin seemed to find this train of thought very interesting, he immediately jumped trains of thought. Pince and Filch shagging on the staff table in the great hall, with McGonagall and Dumbeldore watching. Slowly, picturing every hair and looking from every angle, he took himself through that image. _Guaranteed boner-killer, works every time._

And then Malfoy got back to work, considering exactly what he was going say to the **Dynamic Duo!** when they arrived. Halfway through, he looked at Granger, and asked, "They'll know you're alright before they get here, won't they?" Granger nodded, and Malfoy continued to scheme, laying out expected conversational paths, and expected ... diversions _more like distractions_. "Sit down, we'll take tea together." Malfoy said, his words too soft to be an order, yet commanding nonetheless.

Neither of them had time to fidget, before the room was suddenly stuffed up with two more people. His mouth continuing without his conscious supervision, Draco spared a moment to wonder what Granger had been thinking of, these past seven minutes. "My family has a saying, 'Malfoys always come out on top.' I've called you here to ensure that I'll continue that proud tradition." Draco used a drawling tone that sounded slightly indifferent, while lolling indolently in his chair. It would hopefully convince these imbeciles that he wasn't planning on attacking them outright as a prelude to a decent conversation.

"Malfoy, can you _possibly_ be any more arrogant?" _And that would be Potter, who has either decided to grow a sense of humor, somehow, or has been permanently mentally warped through too much exposure to Snape's detentions. Best not to ask._

"Only if I decided I could beat you at Quiddich." Draco smiled a deliberately cold and arrogant smile, _because I could beat you at anything else_. In a deliberately polite tone, he asked, "Have a seat, there's tea aplenty..."

Potter looked a little askance at the table, before sitting down deliberately across from Draco. _Good, that's the right move._ The Weasel spun the chair before sitting down, with the result that his knees were nearly to hitting both Potter and Malfoy, as he leaned forward across the back of the chair. _The hell is that about? It's **not** useful for fighting, and it just looks uncouth._

The Weasel spoke up, his face having finally reached brick-red, and the words poured forth like steam out of a teakettle, too impatient to stay quiet a moment longer. "How do we know the tea isn't poisoned?!"

Draco Malfoy stood up, and poured the tea, as he said quietly, "If it was, I would have had Granger pour it." His quiet, silvered eyes were completely on Potter, almost as if the Weasel wasn't there.

As was typical, the Weasel spoke up heatedly, "Hermione wouldn't do that! She's our friend, she'd _never_ do that on your life!" Beside him, Potter looked thoughtful, as if thoughts were difficult to fit through his brain, and each one was something worth turning over five times before speaking.

"That's not true, actually. It's just that you wouldn't make her do that." Malfoy said mildly, as if being yelled at by Ron was a daily occurrence, and not worth any special consideration. His eyes remained deadset on Potter, watching him closely.

"Was that a threat or a promise, Malfoy?" Potter said, a bit back in the conversation, but... he was a Gryffindor, and one gave them a bit of an allowance for being slow.

Malfoy rolled his eyes, somehow seeming ten again, as he said smoothly, "It was an _explanation_ , which you asked for, I believe." He paused a moment, and then said mildly, "You may take it as a threat or a promise, I'll hardly stop you."

"MALFOY!" Ron shouted, his voice ringing through the cavern, when Potter made a circular gesture with his forefinger, and abruptly the noise stopped.

"There, now we can have a more civilized volume level." Potter said with a smile, gesturing at a bit of parchment that was... recording the Weasel's words. _Hmph. So that wasn't just a silencing spell. I'd be more impressed if I didn't know Granger found the spell. Still, she's got her wand handy, Potter didn't need to cast... Was that to impress lil' ol' me?_

[a/n: Please, write a review! This isn't much of a cliffhanger, but it makes a decent break before the longer bits of this conversation...]


	19. Draco, Threats do not a Security Make!

"Now then, now that you've stopped threatening us, and Ron has kindly stopped hollering at the top of his lungs, perhaps you might have something better than a threat to convince me that you're not actively trying to get us killed?" Harry Potter said, leaning forward, his cat-green eyes intently focused on Malfoy's face.

Draco Malfoy let out a long-suffering sigh, his eyes going so far as to slide shut, as his face crumpled down onto his hands. "If you insist, I suppose I must." He took a deep breath, more along the lines of preparing to dive into water, and then belted, "I Love Lucy! Harry Potter's File, quick as you can!" Draco turned his head back to the table, and looked at Ron Weasley, who seemed to have stopped screaming at him. Granger and Potter were looking at each other, as if they were sharing a private joke, at least he hoped that was what they were doing, as they seemed to be nearly at capacity and liable to break out into laughter at any time. Draco sighed, and said softly, "Not a word of this leaves this cavern, or you'll find burning to death a fitting reward for loose lips." _Not that he'd be the one casting the spell, of course. His father was not likely to take an attack on his dignity sitting down._ "My mother's pet name for my father is Lucy, and the house elf I just called is also named Lucy. She's older, of course - a bit hard of hearing, hence the shouting, and not liable to change her name to convenience others. So rather than shortening her name, we lengthened it. 'I Love Lucy' is what she'll respond to." _The only thing she'll respond to, in fact._ Draco Malfoy looked around the table, hoping his face wasn't red from embarrassment, and then realizing it didn't really matter, so long as they minded their tongues. "I know you're dying to laugh, so best get it out of your systems now. A word of this leaves this place, and I won't be rescuing you." A gale of laughter seemed to blow in from all directions, and Draco rather suddenly wanted to punch someone. It wasn't _his_ fault that his mother had come up with a stupid nickname. And Draco Malfoy _hated_ to look ridiculous, particularly in front of people whose respect... would make things easier on him.

With an invisible thump, the Potter file - clad in a black manilla envelope, with green letters that sparkled slightly, and spelt out Harry Potter. Passing the file to Potter, Draco spat mildly, "There you go. Proof you asked for." Crossing his arms and leaning back in his seat, Draco kept his eyes focused on Harry, as he said, "Satisfied?" _Obviously not, he hasn't read it yet, nor has any knowledge of the file at all..._

As Weasel continued to shout, Harry Potter opened the file, and began to read.

[a/n: Any guesses on what's in the file? Draco, my dears, has a rather brutal sense of honesty. And yes, the title's right. Draco shouldn't try using threats as a security for other people's lives. Draco: _It was an explanation!_ _And a pointed one at that!_

This entire conversation reads a _hell_ of a lot differently from potter's perspective. Tell you what, give me 20 reviews and I'll give you Potter's perspective too.]


	20. The rather brutal ordeal of taking tea

Harry Potter's eyes flickered down the page, almost skimming, as if he knew what he was reading before he started. Granger looked antsy, like she wanted to grab the entire thing out of Potter's hands. The Weasel? Well, he kept right on ranting, even if in perfect, spellsung silence. _Kind of creepy, that,_ Malfoy thought, and resolved to watch Potter instead. After the first was skimmed, he dove straight into the second. And then the third. Draco was careful to keep a smirk off his face, _try not to be insulting, you're trying to convince these people you can actually be trusted. Ha, what a laugh! Anyone trusting a Slytherin. Hell, Draco could hardly trust his own mother, and he surely didn't trust his own father, the rapacious bastard_. It took Potter twice the time to read the third, which Draco wasn't surprised about in the slightest. And then Potter started counting, not bothering to read more than a few lines on each plan. Finally, he looked up at Draco and spoke. "Well, Draco Malfoy, I'd estimate that the first three plans here each have a 40% chance of killing me, and combined, more than a 95% chance." Potter looked at Draco, with a searching look on his face - Draco smirked inwardly, _he won't be getting any tells off me_. "So why are there fifteen more, after that?"

Draco Malfoy leaned backward, and drawled, "Stress relief, if you must know. I couldn't have been terribly serious about anything past about the third, and I wrote the first when I was eleven, after all."

"And this is supposed to show that we should trust you? When you've been busy planning my death as a sort of _stress relief_?" Potter looked flabbergasted, but as this was the general result of a civil conversation between a Slytherin and a Gryffindor, Malfoy didn't pay it much heed.

"It's supposed to show you that I'm perfectly able to come up with better plans for killing you than spending a nice afternoon taking tea together. Rather a brutal ordeal, that. Just why wouldn't I use an Avada? It would all turn out the same, wouldn't it, now?" Malfoy said, rather pointedly.

Potter looked down, reading over a few more of them - and then started skimming, differently. He was clearly reading some part of it, but not everything. And not on every file either. _What **has** he figured out? What is he looking at? He's caught some sort of pattern, hasn't he? _ Malfoy thought, eyeing him closely.

Half a minute later, Potter looked up and asked, "Seven, eight, Twelve, and fourteen? They're missing something, aren't they?" The words came out sharply, interrogatives that were more statement than question. Suddenly, Potter sounded uncertain, "You were planning on killing Voldemort, weren't you?"

Malfoy responded with a smooth nod, drawling, "Why Potter, however did you guess? Twelve was for killing my aunt though, not dear old Tom."

While Potter frowned down at the notes, Granger started at Draco's appelation for Tom Riddle, opened her mouth to squawk something utterly thoughtless, before Malfoy interrupted, "My ears are bigger than you think. And you spoke of him often enough at school."

Still frowning, Potter looked up at Malfoy, and said slowly, "There's no room to gloat, on those. There's a sense that this starts something... it's in how the ending is set, the circumscription of it. If you were only bent on killing me, you could kill me in any number of ways... but those feel tight like a straightjacket, constricting like a snake." Potter's voice had started slowly, but had picked up speed as he went, the last words nearly tripping over his tongue.

Malfoy muttered to himself, "Sometimes, I forget that you can actually think." _Here goes nothing._ Malfoy twirled his finger under the table, and gentle as a cat's padded paw, brushed against Potter's thoughts, as brief as the glint of starlight on a cloudy night. And then he waited.

Potter's eyes widened, as he stared, intently, at Malfoy - and then Malfoy felt the gentle heat of Potter's mind touching his. Quickly, he pulled up a memory. "It's easy, all you have to do is skim the surface" Goyle, Crabbe, and Malfoy had been at the Black Lake, and Malfoy had been teaching Goyle how to skip rocks. Malfoy looked over at Crabbe, on the wooden dock, before saying drily, "If you look too deep, you'll fall in." Crabbe, in the memory, had been leaning over the edge of the dock, trying to see into the depths. Thinking very deliberately, Malfoy showed the kelpy seaweed stretching out, swirling, ready to grab someone so foolish as to fall into the mirky depths.

[a/n: I am sorry! Malfoy and Potter's conversation is going to be longer and more involved than it needs to be... They're using a fairly clunky version of communications, and I want it to show...

Read and review, let me know if that I Love Lucy crack was entirely too off tone, or if the whole "mindreading" thing seems out of place. (Potter's a natural at legimency, otherwise he wouldn't be pulling this off with next to no training).]


	21. The sound of a cat's paw

Harry Potter looked at Draco Malfoy, and then deliberately looked down at the papers in his hand. At the sight of Granger trying to turn her head (and scootch over) to see what they were, Draco Malfoy had a most marvelous idea. _Perfect thing to share._ Harry Potter looked up again, steadily, at Draco, and Draco felt the brush of a cat's tail on the edge of his mind. _There you are!_ he projected, a rather gleeful (and quite young) Draco pulling Dobby out of a half-clean cauldron by his feet (which had been sticking out). _I've got something I need you to do..._

 _Don't!_ It was a sound of defiance, and one that Potter was sure to recognize, that was Neville's rememberall, from way back at the beginning of Hogwarts. And then there was almost a bird's eye view, with Potter passing a book that Granger was pining to see. Draco repeated the entire thought-chain - and then he felt Potter do something odd, and he was remembering them on the pitch, nodding at each other - two captains ready to play a game. Uncharacteristically impulsively, Draco projected, _Five galleons she can't last three minutes_ , before flushing slightly. Potter summoned another memory, Draco and Zambini saying, _You're on!_ as they started a game of broomstick tag.

Suddenly, there was a loud, insistent tapping that seemed to reverberate like echoes trailing off forever, rebounding upon the person in the center, as each tap made all the other echoes grow louder. _Owww..._ That was Draco Malfoy, age two, having fallen and hit his head on a crystal skull, his scarlet blood pumping over his platinum hair. Potter broke the contact, looking at Ron mildly, though Draco suspected Potter's head had to be hurting just as much as his own.

Ron, it turned out, was currently tapping the paper that had been recording ... his thoughts. Or rather, his most intemperate words, that he had been shouting out as if anyone could hear. Rather than risk Granger grabbing for this, Draco swiftly snatched it out from under Ron's hand. _What did the mangified whelp have to say?_

[Read and review, it'll mean more chapters. Taking polls on what Ron should be called - be creative!

This whole thing does read differently from Potter's angle...

Anyone figured out what Ron's going to go off about?

Feel free to use your _imagination_ to figure out why Draco's flushing at the three minutes thing... Or you could review, and then maybe I'd show you from Potter's side.]


	22. Hobgoblin of inconstant thought

Draco Malfoy read over the intemperate list of insults, giving his opinions on each as he read down them.

"Boring."

"Obvious."

"Oooh, I like that one, I'm stealing it."

"Repetitive"

"You were using that one my first year. Find something more creative."

"Everyone knows I'm albino, it's _hardly_ an insult." He wasn't, but if he was going to take offense to simple comments about his appearance...

"Ah! Here we go: "If you're going to come out on top, isn't Voldemort a bit of an obstacle to that?" " Draco Malfoy leaned back and smirked, exuding an essential laziness as he surveyed his audience (and mentally congratulating himself on spitting out that bastard's name without stumbling). Granger was still trying not to crack a grin, and Weasel looked like the thought that he had caught Malfoy in a lie was the best thing that had happened ever happened - and still assessing Malfoy as if he was a snake. Potter just looked watchful, and a bit wary - quite understandable, that.

"Yes, Tom Riddle-" at that, everyone startled around the table, Weasel turning...well, ruddy, he was already quite red, but this was more brown-purple. Potter's feet fell to the floor with a clatter (where had he been hiding them?) and granger, sitting suddenly forward, eyes wide. "You lot can keep a secret, but only when you're trying, honestly! Do you really think I haven't ears?" Malfoy took a deep breath, and giving them a cunning look alongside his trademark smirk, said, "Besides, using his given name is a lot less grandstanding."

"As I was saying, yes, he does pose a bit of a problem. Luckily, I have you fools to help me with that. I propose a bit of Positive Reinforcement. If you get dear old Tom out of the political picture, I'll give you two a free trip around the world - anywhere you like, for five years."

"What's the catch, Malfoy?" Potter asked, his eyes intent.

"No catch atall." Malfoy said, with a broad grin that he knew was far more unnerving than his normal smirk - to which Potter looked disbelieving. (and, unnoticed, on the paper beneath Draco's hand, appeared the line I don't BELIEVE you!) Suddenly, Draco felt a shooting pain through his shin. Jumping up, he began to hop around on the other leg. Noting which side of the table - _Granger._ Glaring at her, he yelped, "You _kicked_ me!" Instantly, he knew that was a mistake - not only was he acting like he was eight, he had completely lost all _semblance_ of dignity. And even Weasel was laughing - doubled over almost, and Potter had his head tilted back with glee.

"And I'd do it again."

"Why'd you _kick_ me?" Malfoy spat, even his anger overshadowed by genuine confusion, as he slowly sat down again, markedly shifting his chair away from Granger and ... towards the Weasel.

In that oh-so-annoying voice (do I _ever_ sound like that? I hope not!), Granger responded, "First, Harry at least had some concerns that I might be under the Imperio - and you'd never think of ordering me to kick you in the shin. Second, you're not a stranger. If you don't act like someone we've known, we'll start wondering who you really are." Weasel looked contemplative at this, before starting in on more insults - the parchment began to roll. "Third, giving less than half the explanation is as good as not giving one at all! Why don't you start by explaining why this counts as positive reinforcement?" Worse than Granger's voice, Malfoy thought, was when she was _right_.

[a/n: Malfoy is discovering that having Granger as an ally is an inconstant helpmeet at best. She'll do what she thinks will advance the goals, and is quite unpredictable.

Anyone figured out why Ron's here?

Read and Review - or I'll go play with my other stories.]


	23. A Proper Explanation, or else

Malfoy gave a noncommital nod, before looking at Weasel and Potty. "You'll do as a distraction - or bait, whichever way you want to think about it. There's a considerable ... element of people on my side that I'd like distracted, for a considerable amount of time. If you can keep them out of England for me, you'll well deserve the free travel." _I'll help as I can - no reason not to, really - but no sense in promising..._

"Your ... side?" Potter asked, his mien troubled with thoughts that he was clearly not sharing with anyone else at the moment.

"The conservative side. You'll be used to thinking of them as purebloods, of course." Malfoy knit his fingers together. "Some of them haven't a whit of sense, and nobody left to tell them to put their wands down like good little boys." Potter looked at Malfoy, curious despite himself. "I intend to be the one telling them to holster their wands, of course. But that will take some time, before I can collect enough power to pull it off."

Malfoy felt a brush against his mind - the feel of wind on his face, as he raced high above the school. _If that wasn't the Imperio you were threatening, what were you talking about?_ Malfoy's head nearly bounced, as he found the conversation jumping erratically from an incident where he had seen Potter racing down into the dungeons, to the teaching of illegal curses by the-man-who-wasn't-Moody, to Snape hissing into his seven year old face, to Potter himself poking at Malfoy who had been deep in discussion with Zambini - about something entirely unrelated to Mr. Nosy Face. The irritation had been remembered, but they both seemed to shift at it.

 _A Threat: if Granger would be willing to kill her friends - if they were_ _ **stupid**_ _enough to not listen to her, what do you think she'd do to an uncertain ally who had just killed her best friends_ _ **in cold blood**_ _?_

 _A Promise: if Granger was pouring the tea, she'd have agreed to it. As I'm_ _ **clearly**_ _biased, I'll let her decide if you lot need killing or not._

Malfoy's head leaped from memory to memory: "a threat" was him holding one finger up, staving off Crabbe and Goyle, staring daggers at Nott, but backing down. "If Granger" was a snide comment, bisected neatly. "would be willing to kill" was a discussion about a younger Ravenclaw they were considering for the Dark Lord's service (how different that seemed now). "her friends" was a spat out epithet, done for pure amusement alone - implying that Granger was sleeping with both of them. "If they were stupid enough to not listen" was Snape speaking to the Dark Lord himself. "to her" was a bland picture of Narcissa smiling as the Parkinsons glided over to greet her - Malfoy had been speaking to Nott, who was not in view. "What do you think she'd do to...?" was Malfoy looking at Flint, idly fiddling with his wand as he spoke of Bellatrix, whom Flint was watching. An uncertain ally was Malfoy himself, speaking about himself, of course, smirking all the while at Zambini ("is better than an uncertain enemy", was how he had finished that). "Who had just killed her best friends in cold blood?" was himself, washing his bloody hands in front of a mirror ( _beneath his surface thoughts, Draco's mind thought - let Potter look, see who he allies with)._

Malfoy was smirking that devious smirk, as he said "A promise... if granger" (buried deep: _betcha that makes Potter's blood run cold, ages old as the memory lies)_ A spattered tea, as a very young Malfoy stammered out an explanation. "She'd have agreed to it" was said with a leer, as Draco looked at Daphne, and then over at Parvati Patil. "as I'm clearly biased" was more of Malfoy's usual grandstanding arrogance - playing to the cheap seats was the phrase. "I'll let her decide if you lot need killing or not" was said with a drawl, looking at shivvering muggles ( _hope potter doesnt' realize that was Bellatrix I meant)._

 _ **This** is what I hate about you! _ Potter screeched in Malfoy's head, _Not that you're a bully, though you were, but that I **never** have **any** clue just what you've said!_

 _Malfoy's head spun, as he listened to the pictures in his mind spin about. "I never have any clue" was a comment he was making about girls, for instance_

 _Quickly stuffing the thought deep in his mental lake, Malfoy thought, "You'll get used to it, everyone else seems to." Granted, Crabbe and Goyle had just gotten used to never understanding him. Potter was smarter than that, and Malfoy was sure that even Mr. LazyLikeALion would catch on, given enough time._

Meanwhile, Granger had evidently gotten impatient with Potter just leafing idly through Malfoy's plans, half standing to grab at the folder.

 _Three minutes, ten seconds, Potter. You win. I didn't think you had that much sadist in you._ The timings had been on broomsticks, Crabbe and Goyle fooling around on the Malfoy estate, the "Potter you win" growled deep in hate, a first year incensed with someone else being better than him at anything. And then Malfoy was smirking at Pansy, relishing her rejecting yet another pathetic Hufflepuff.

 _Potter's laugh was golden-brown, a rich deep hue, as it poured around him (who was that from? it was his memory, dammit!). Flashes of the Weasel twins began to appear and disappear, almost before Malfoy could see what had happened. Malfoy was momentarily baffled, until he saw the ending pictures, himself staring jealously at the two tall twins hoisting Potter up, celebrating him and gathering him into a hug. Malfoys didn't get hugs, certainly not from Slytherins._

[a/n: Perspective, we love it! Read and review, folks, the train's picking up speed!

I did warn you about the legimency thing. Let me know if you love the wordpictures, and want more, hate them and want them gone, or think they're just fine.]


	24. Fess Up, Malfoy!

Potter leaned on one of his hands, his elbow balanced on the table. "I don't believe you, Malfoy."

"What's there not to believe?" Malfoy asked, his smile well hidden behind indifference.

"Why, the truth, of course. Slytherins lie as easily with the truth as they do with lies."

"Easier, actually. Less to get confused, that way."

"So, you led off with motivations most selfish and petty."

"So I did..."

"I want the _rest_ of the truth, Malfoy."

"Have I ever given you reason to think that I'm anything other than selfish and petty?"

"Just now, yes. You know, concealing the truth makes it seem like you have something to hide."

"And if I do?"

"I like to know who I'm dealing with. Helps to make decisions if you trust the people you're dealing with."

"Reasonable, that. Do you think I ought to trust you?"

"If I commit to a scheme, I'm not going to break it lightly."

"Dodging the question?"

"Not as well as you're doing, Malfoy." Potter gives a small grin that somehow glows. _If I ever managed a grin like that, I'd be on the cover of Witch Weekly till doomsday next._ "One would almost think you don't want us to think you have a heart."

"Maybe I don't. Tomorrow we may be trading curses, and I wouldn't want you to hesitate on my behalf." Around the table, everyone stirred, restlessly. Having been accustomed by the tea to thinking of deals and schemes, the idea of being on the other side of a wand... seemed wrong.

Malfoy continued, "Oh, don't get me wrong, if I could end this war by waving my wand _right now_ , I would. We'd work the rest out, somehow." Malfoy's eyes looked distant, almost haunted, as he glanced around the table, his eyes peering upward more than leveled at the Gryffindors. "This war is such a waste. I wouldn't say a thing against it, if it was only the hotheads who were dying. They're not good for much anyhow." Malfoy was carefully not looking at Weasel... "But everyone's getting drawn in. I'm not _like_ you. I have friends on both sides. And if we don't stop this, somehow, they're all going to _die_." Malfoy took a sudden, deep breath. "Voldemort doesn't understand how to stop the war. He won't stop even if he wins, you know. Just go right on killing. Today's allies are tomorrow's dead bodies." Malfoy shook his head vehemently, and continued, "No, we can solve our arguments, find solutions to problems that don't involve putting everyone six feet under. I want the war over, but I'm no fool. Arguments don't stop when the hexes do." Malfoy crosses his arms, and, with a wry half-smirk, asks, "That enough of a heart for you?"

Potter swirls his tea, looking downward, before looking up to meet Malfoy's gaze. "Awful cold heart you've got there, Slytherin." Malfoy stares at Potter, mildly befuddled by the implicit... acceptance he finds in the depths of Potter's green eyes. _It shouldn't surprise me, he works well with Granger, after all..._

[a/n: Sorry, this one needed to come next.]


	25. Care for a spot of tea?

[a/n: if this chappie looks familiar, read the chapter before this one. Sorry, I got the order mixed up in my head, and then I couldn't put the other in after this one]

Hermione Granger spoke in a perfectly elocuted voice, saying gravely, "It's a good thing you didn't put these into play. Would have wrecked havoc with the prophecy."

Draco Malfoy's head snapped in her general direction, his eyes fixed on hers - breaking all contact with Potter. He fought the urge to bury his head in his hands. "There's a prophecy" Malfoy said, clearly if woodenly. "Of course there's a prophecy," he spat. "Why didn't _anyone_ tell me about this?!"

"Oh, I don't know, Malfoy, did you really expect people to just walk up and tell you, "By the way, there's a prophecy where Potter and Voldemort have a dropdown, no holds barred fight. Do be a dear and try not to kill either before they get the chance?" " Potter said sarcastically, "We can hardly be faulted for thinking that you're a Death Eater, you know. Most Death Eaters aren't malarkey enough to plot how to kill Tom Riddle." Potter kept up the dark humored assault, saying, "Voldemort is hardly going to tell his followers "sorry, I'm not actually invulnerable" " Potter took a breath, his face twisted into a cruel, strangely familiar smile, "As for your father, I think he's just embarrassed. Failing to get the prophecy got him chucked in Azkaban, after all."

"The perils of independent action," Granger said, with a blazing smile - as like to set his clothes ablaze as warm him.

" _Nevermind_ , I don't even want to know." _That was a total, and utter lie, of course._ Malfoy shook his head.

All Draco heard was the word, "Liar" and he started, looking at Potter, _of all people_ , calling him out on a lie! Oh, the _humanity_! The _humiliation_! Okay, even Draco could concede (in his own mind at least) that he was just being melodramatic for its own sake.

"Fine, spill your guts. Or don't." Draco crossed his arms and looked away, knowing that he had let more than a second's worth of ... greed shine through his eyes. Any act of indifference would merely be seen through straightaway. Which wouldn't stop him from acting indifferent, of course. Bloody Gryffindors might feel obligated to share otherwise.

"Maybe later..." Potter smiled, and it was a genuine smile filled with just enough knowing twinkle. _He knows that will drive me stir crazy - which is exactly why he's doing it. Not that knowing that **helps** , of course... _"Now what's this I hear about you wanting to switch sides and fight Voldemort?"

"I'm not switching sides, Pothead." _Well, that resolve lasted longer than I thought._ "I'm improving my side. You can _keep_ your side. You're welcome to it, really. I don't want your side." Dulleyed blank incomprehension from the two dimwits.

"My side: The conservative side. The Purebloods. Your side:" At this Draco nodded more at Granger than at the other two. "The liberals. The 'can't we all get along with the bloodthirsty monsters' - aside from Tom Riddle, of course."

Pothead leaned back in his chair, tilting two legs off the floor. _I hope he cracks his head._ "I don't really care about any of that, you know. Riddle killed my parents, and he's terrorizing the rest of Brittania. As far as I'm concerned, if you're going to sheathe your wand and get out of my way, you're on my side." Potter... was telling the truth.

"Besides, who knows if I'll even manage to escape Riddle alive? Like as not, we take each other out." And... that was even worse, the idea that Potter was...resigned... to dying. Calmly, Malfoy cast a simple, wordless spell beneath the table. And then he splashed his (now lukewarm) tea directly in Potter's face. _Must not smirk, must not smirk._

As mild as milk, Malfoy said coldly, clearly, calmly, "Wake up, Potter. You _can't_ think like that. Not if you want to win. Take it from me, I plan... going into _any_ plan thinking you might die - it's not going to _work_. There's always another plan. There's always a _better_ plan. You have to build in margin, avoid committing everything you've got. Or you're going to die _for no good reason_." The tea continued to drip off Potter's face, which had paled - and steam drifted up from the other mugs about the table. Malfoy simply reached over and poured himself another (hot but not steamy) cup of tea. _Thanks, mum. Knew that trick would work._

[a/n: Malfoy stole that last trick from his mum, whose icy demeanor works wonders in a social situation. If you do something completely inappropriate, and then avoid referencing it at all... has it really happened?

Now be a dear and write a review!

Up Next: Potter is done being patient - and has had enough time to think through what Malfoy's been saying. Potter is slow and ... a bit methodical, but he does actually think.]


	26. Plans within Plans

Potter gently wiped his face off, leaving tea still dripping down his chin. "Suppose you're right" he said slowly and calmly.

Suddenly, Potter's eyes snapped to Granger, and he said in a low venomous tone, "You already agreed, _didn't you_?"

"Of course she did, Potter. I didn't summon her here to be a go-between." Sighing a little, Draco Malfoy puffed himself up - doing his best impression of himself at age twelve and a half. "I am irreplaceable. Granger is necessary. You are important."

"Oh, I _must_ be missing something..." Potter said, his voice somehow mocking Draco's normal drawl, while mimicking it perfectly.

"Plenty of things, I'd wager, though it's certainly not my fault if you lack..." And abruptly Granger trod on Malfoy's toe with her heel.

Harry Potter's face was blank - not quite slackjawed, but it was... the face that Draco Malfoy would wear if he was truly disturbed. "Why? Hermione, why?" Potter's eyes started flicking back and forth between Granger and Malfoy, disbelieving and discontent in the same expression.

Draco Malfoy was certain Weasel was still yelling, though he hadn't looked at the parchment to confirm it - his attention was held rapt by Potter. He hadn't expected Potter to go off like a firecracker - and certainly not over this.

Granger met Harry's eyes levelly, saying simply, "It's a good plan, Harry. With it, we might have a shot."

"How could you possibly decide to make a deal with Draco Malfoy without talking with us?!" Potter shot back, his entire demeanor reeking of betrayal and hurt.

 _Oh._ Thought Draco Malfoy, his understanding crystallizing in one solitary moment. _My turn!_ "She had no choice. One time offer. You're here because she accepted."

"You shouldn't have!" Potter said, climbing to his feet.

"A deal's a deal, Harry. But you ought to know me well enough by now to know that if you spot malfeasance or malevolent intent, I will break any _supposed_ deal." Granger snapped.

"I'd expect no less, mind. Deliberately keeping your opponent in the dark in order to wrangle concessions out of them is _hardly_ the work of an ally."

"But you said we weren't on the same side!" Potter spat at Draco.

"Politics makes strange bedfellows, does it not?" Draco Malfoy said, his fingers tented together in front of his face.

"He's giving me the key to the Malfoy's Library, Harry!" Granger, her eyes lit as bright as Weasel's hair, hissed at her best friend.

Potter gave Granger an incredulous stare, "Was _that_ what he bribed you with?" It didn't exactly take a genius to come up with the idea that Potter was thinking that any deal that involved Granger and a library was obviously one she was not going to be objective about.

Looking dead straight at Malfoy, Harry Potter spat, "Tell me everything. Then I'll decide."

Malfoy, feigning an air of utter unconcern, leaned back and said, "And if I don't?"

"Then I leave. You did say I was important, did you not?"And now it was Potter that affected unconcern, if not nearly as well as Draco generally pulled the shtick off.

"If you must leave, then go. I'm not going to waste my time explaining a long, and very boring plan, to you halfwits. Explaining it once took patience enough. Get Granger to explain it." Granger opened her mouth to start that explanation, and Draco Malfoy shot her a glare that would have curdled milk - and barely got Granger to _shut up_. "Later. Not now." Malfoy shrugged in a slow and elaborate way. "I'm not asking you to trust me, you realize? Trust that Granger knows what she's doing, and if half the plan was relevant, she'd have mentioned it by now." Malfoy took another deep breath. "No, the central question here is not 'how smart is the plan, how neat, how detailed...' but is merely 'Can Harry Potter trust Draco Malfoy'"

"Allow me to simplify the situation. Granger may go to the Malfoy library - I'd suggest alone, but if you must, you may send a Phoenix member. Only... neither of you. Too tempting, you might say." Malfoy's smile was volcanic glass. "Send someone with a bit of discretion, Zambini will do - or if that absolutely won't work, send McGonagall."

"How do you possibly expect me to trust you?"

"ask me anything. I won't promise to answer, but I'll do my best."

Draco could see the moment inspiration struck Potter, he sat straight, and looked Malfoy in the eye.

[a/n: anyone who gets the inspiration Potter's had gets a free sundae!

Read and Review folks]


	27. A cat's tail brushing your leg

Draco Malfoy _wasn't_ going to tell Potter. He _hadn't_ wanted to tell Potter the plan in the first place, but not telling him anything at all, somehow seemed intangibly more dangerous - a sort of itchy feeling slithering across his back. Potter was far more fickle than Granger ever seemed to be, his fire burning and simmering and boiling - oil to her water. Steam would burn you too, but it seared cleanly, didn't boil and blister and bubble. Without a second thought, he gently reached out towards Potter's mind, trusting in his own reputation for deft dealing and cunning plans to guide Potter's mind towards a more understandable direction. Deep in the depths of the lake, a thought coiled slowly, _Because I don't exactly understand this myself..._ Above that, in the clear water that sparkled in the sunshine, he told himself firmly that the Golden Trio needed to trust each other, or they wouldn't _finish the job_. Deeper in the dusky depths of the lake, the dingy water whispered "liar..."

Potter's mind, gentle as a sunbeam, caressed the smooth, windswept edge of Draco's mind, and he let him in, confident that Potter would respect boundaries. "What is it?" Draco's memory snapped at Crabbe and Goyle, creeping into his room while he was studying - for once the memory aligning with Potter's emotion.

"Here's the plan," Draco barked out, his voice managing to be cultured and urbane while drilling Crabbe and Goyle at Quiddich. Draco mentally winced at all the time he had wasted teaching them anything. Potter sent back a memory of Draco's - silent and _listening_ , surprisingly enough, eavesdropping on god-knows-what, somewhere in Hogwarts. What wasn't important, what was important was his attention. _Good, I have it._

"Give peace a chance" - a broken fragment of a song, heard in the darkness as Draco walked outside an open window, his body cowled in black. A fragment of a song that had tugged at Draco in the crisp night air - a peaceful haven, if only for a moment, before Draco himself shattered it with screams.

And back to Quiddich again, " _Whatever_ it takes. _Whoever_ gets in our way, we crush them." Draco's amusement at his younger self swirled around both their consciousnesses.

"Was I ever so young..." Draco, with a surprisingly wistful smirk, his finger reading from a book, looking down from his high nook in the library... at Potter and Weasley and Granger, who were roughhousing (well, Potter and Weasel were, Granger was scolding them). Closing the book with a snort, Draco says softly, "Never."

Turning back to the topic at hand, Draco's listening to Crabbe and Goyle asking, "So, that's the plan?"

"Yeah, nice and neat and simple. Now don't ask questions, just do your part, and we'll _win_." His memory cut off before Crabbe and Goyle could cheer.

Now it was Potter's turn to choose a memory, "Why didn't you say so in the first place?" It was Snape, graciously handing a very young Draco a cookie, his mouth curled into a half-quirked smile.

Inspiration struck like a bolt out of the deep blue sky. "I can _show_ you things here," Draco whispered urgently to Pansy in a broom closet. "I can't tell _anyone_." Draco spat at Snape, his sixth year at Hogwarts, the bitter bastard leaning, looming over him and fishing for more than Draco could possibly say. _There, let him think I mean a spell, lull him for a moment into a whisper of complacency._ As Potter's alert presence dimmed, just slightly, Draco struck. Memory after memory unfolded like tentacles, each one hungrily wrapping itself around Potter. Through it all, the yawning horror, the despair held down and bottled by sheer force of will and rage.

That haunting sound, again, that fragment of a song Malfoy'd never fully hear, "Give peace a chance..." And the fierce, ironic grin on Malfoy's face, as he burst through the back door in a shatter of glass. An Avada Kedavra sent towards the mother bending over to pull a roast out of the oven - she half fell in, and her face began to melt as Draco turned away. The father, kind enough to deliver himself to Draco on a silver platter, the perfect test of a new spell... "Sepsis Sanguina!" he hissed, his voice barely louder than the dryer clanking in the background. The father fell, writhing, as Draco looked at the four perfect sets of shoes on the rug. Two children, then. Upstairs he climbed, and then he made them scream, using the pure voices to spread terror like acrid, sulphurous fumes. Outside, neighbors stirred, but inside? Inside there was the ineffable peace of the dead.

As Draco apparated, the memory shifted...

"Kill a family of Muggles. Any will do." The voice was Snape's, it was hard and just verging on cruelty... exactly the tone to take with scared 17 year olds, who were just told their foul orders. Draco Malfoy apparated, and walked through a narrow alley in Newcastle. From his bearing, his quiet tread, it was clear he was hunting. Around and around he paced, his path growing longer with each circle, until he heard it. Screams, drunken shouts. And, over it all, the high soprano shout of a young boy. As Draco Malfoy approached, he heard the boy's cry torn off, a ragged end to an unholy shriek. A simple spell to unlock the door, and Draco Malfoy shot two Avada Kedavra's at the parents. The boychild seemed nearly dead, it's blood staining the wall above it. Draco stared just long enough to see a shallow breath, before he apparated - as he did, Harry heard the dark crystal thought in Malfoy's head, "Play dead, kid."

The memory shifted again... inconceivably brighter, every color shining, somehow truer and bolder to boot. Draco stumbled, and he was suddenly looking at a small girl - looking at her from about her own height, as she stood, her tanned face pallid with shock. "Drakie... they won't move! I've tried everything!" And Draco looked behind her, at her parents. Draco's astonished, and mildly peeved thought: _But the war's over! They can't! They didn't even DO anything!"_

Through it all, the yawning horror, the despair held down and bottled by sheer force of will and rage.

"Everything has a cost. I'm _bloody_ sick of being the only one paying." Draco carefully pulled his memories away from Potter. Again, Inspiration struck. "Talk me out of it if you can. If it's a bad idea, tell me now. Granger won't be turned from a path she's set on for love or money" _oh, how true that was!_ _Fortunate, this time..._ "But me? I'm listening."

"You're hiding nearly everything from me, aren't you?" Fragments of conversations flew through Draco's head, as Potter pieced together the sentence - a game of hide and go seek, his father throwing his teachings in Draco's face, Snape breathing down Draco's face, his entire body looming over the small boy.

"Enough, at any rate." Malfoy's voice was clipped, and he was glaring at some Ravenclaws in the library. He was obviously talking to someone in his eyrie, but they were behind/beside him, and thus impossible to see.

"Why?!" This was a howl, and Malfoy's young, pointed face at age ten perfectly suited Potter's current one. _Not that that would be exactly mature to note, now would it?_ _Try to get along_...

"Because you're a leader." That was Fudge talking with Lucius, Draco somewhere in the curtains, covertly listening. "Because betrayal suits me more than it suits you." Definitely Lucius, purring at ... Mr. Weasley? "Because if you know the list, everyone will be asking if you deliberately let people die because it was _convenient_. But, I can tell you this..." "If you knew everything that I know now, you'd say yes." Lucius' voice had a note of false sincerity, but all that Draco let show of his emotions was clear as sunlight, the sincerity as obvious as the truthfullness.

"You know me that well?" Potter scoffed, in Malfoy's voice, as Pansy spun a tale about how wonderfully they'd work as a married couple.

"I do, I'm a Slytherin, it comes with the territory. I want this war to end, but wars don't end when you sign a peace treaty. They end when the last person with the will to fight dies. That was a pureblood girl in that last memory you know, I was five at the time - she was seven."

Malfoy's voice came out in a whisper, as he looked across a windswept loch, asking "tell me if it's worth it... is victory worth killing a kid's parents?" With a scowl, and a much darker voice, "torturing the other side?"

"No, it's not." Malfoy seemed to have an uncanny knack for contemplation - here he was in a turret in Malfoy Manor, whispering words to the wind. Potter's decisive nature, his emotions coloring the simple scene, gave it an eldrich finality.

"Then agree to the deal. It'll be worth your while, I promise" More Lucious, now proposing to Narcissa. "oh, that reminds me, I promised Granger that if Weaselette (No I don't remember her first name!) wanted to tour the world with you, I'd pay for it." Fragments of a dozen conversations whirled through Draco's head.

"Really?" And the word was imbued with just as much "you'd do something because Granger asked" and "you promised" as "you're spending money for a third person to tour the world"

"You may need another wand." This was Malfoy with a smirk, allying himself with Zambini and Nott, as they launched a daring raid... on the Ravenclaws. _Subtle is not blindly going after Gryffindor every time._ That was a good enough thought that Malfoy allowed it to rise to the surface of his lake, so that Potter could hear it too.

[a/n: up next: back in the real world.

 _Please_ , Read and Review... in this chapter, you're getting a chance to see why Draco's had some character development.

He's not exactly had an _easy_ war.]


	28. Back in the real world

Outside of Potter and Malfoy's linked minds, Granger looked up at Malfoy. "Is it okay if I borrow these? I'd like to study them a bit further..."

Malfoy responded flatly, "Obscure my handwriting, and burn them when you're done." His drawling voice sounded bored, but the expectation that Granger would do exactly as he said was plainly evident.

"You won't need them back?" Granger asked, her fingers twitching with the need for a quill, as she wrote notes on the air.

"No point, really. As I said, I wasn't really planning on using them. There's always more where that came from, though I may start in on Sirius Black next. I fancy a challenge, and Potter's too easy to find." _and bait,_ Malfoy thought wryly.

"Sirius is dead." Potter said, flatter than Draco Malfoy had sounded, _and that was quite the feat._ _I suppose it's hard to keep the sarcasm out of my voice._

"Oh, _really_?" Malfoy drawled, as if he had suddenly discovered a new use for slugs in a potion. "Nevermind, I _don't_ want to know." _In fact, there's a surprising_ _ **large**_ _amount of things I don't want to know about... hmm..._

Malfoy, feeling impish, knocked gently on Potter's mind, once twice - and then gone like a flash. Potter simply stared at him, and Malfoy did the same thing again. With an inaudible sigh, Potter brushed against Malfoy's mind, and heard him say/remember "I want to try something... simpler." (it was a memory of Malfoy in Transfiguration of all things, whispering to Nott).

On the surface of Malfoy's mind, he was coaching a battle plan. It was fifth year Quiddich, and he was letting Potter look at the entire thing. As the memory spooled out, he felt Potter's interest. As the memory finally was unwound, Draco asked, "Thoughts?"

"You were a fool to take Crabbe and Goyle." This was a memory of Lucius lecturing his son. "And there's no way I'd fall for that feint." _That_ was a memory of Malfoy laughing cruelly at Potter.

Malfoy launched into a bevy of questions, mercifully ones that he had asked his team. Potter knew the answers down pat, Malfoy was both surprised and pleased to see.

Finally, Malfoy said, "This'll do just fine, it will." (It was a memory of a rather remarkable prank on Prof. Snape, that everyone had blamed on the twins - who were glad to take credit, so... no harm done). "Keep it under your hat. I don't want Weasel and Granger knowing."

"Why's that?" The hostility in Malfoy's voice in the memory was remarkable, as he looked at 'his friend' Zambini. It matched Potter's thought-pattern perfectly.

"Basic strategy." That was Moody, lecturing the class. "Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead." Snape loomed over a very young Draco, who had patently been caught eavesdropping.

"Maybe I ought to kill you then, Malfoy?" Harry's grin seemed to light up the memory - which was of Dolokov hissing his defiance at Malfoy being placed above him (discretely out of view of the Dark Lord, of course).

"You can try, Potter, you can try." Another Quiddich memory, them floating high above the pitch - eyes ever roving, ever watchful for the glint of gold.

[a/n: I mean it! Read and Review! (I am, **actually** , almost done with this "oneshot"... 28 chapters later)

Have I managed to keep your attention for 30,000 words of a _single conversation_? How's the tension?

Malfoy and Potter have been staring at each other for a while now. Just like Weasley has been shouting, inaudibly, for a longer while now...

Everything changes next chapter!

(aren't you glad I didn't break the last chapter at the "then Malfoy struck" line? I was tempted, but I shook off temptation!)

Also, anyone got any clue why Granger wants the notes?]


	29. Potter wasn't there

"Malfoy..." Potter drawled out, the precisely flawed imitation of his own voice instantly putting Draco Malfoy on edge. "Do you remember the third person Tom Riddle asked you to kill?"

Draco Malfoy swallowed. Of course he remembered. He remembered everyone that he killed. Absolutely, positively, everyone. He had given up trying to remember all the people he'd ordered to be killed, of course. For one thing, there were entirely too many. And it always seemed so impersonal, if you didn't see someone's life leaking out of them like blood pouring out of a slit neck. "Yes," he said, filtering through his memories until he brought the person to the fore. Arabella Figg was it? One of the members of the Order - and one of the better deaths, he thought wryly. At least he could pretend he was executing a war criminal - or at least a captured warrior. Not mindlessly slaughtering those too young to even hope for a miracle. The weight of his thoughts turned Draco's sudden smile cruel and cold, as he said tonelessly, "Arabella Figg, it was. A good friend of yours, she was?"

Harry Potter mindlessly fiddled with his hands, Ron Weasley shouted imprecations and curses at Malfoy, and Granger continued to read - or at least pretended to. Because Draco Malfoy recognized the stillness of her hands, it was the same stillness his had when he was eavesdropping, and only pretending to shut the entire world out.

"No, not really." Harry Potter said, seeming uncomfortable. "She... watched over me, when I was a kid." Draco looked at Potter levelly, somehow sensing in Poter's quiescence, more to say and not less. "She let me stay there, let me rot in a room no bigger than a closet, let me starve. I sometimes think I'd have preferred Tom Riddle to my relatives."

"But... she wasn't your relative, was she?" Draco Malfoy asked.

"No. But really, this is beside the point. I want to know what was running through your mind when you killed her." And Potter eyed Malfoy intently, his green eyes hard as emeralds, and just as bright.

"I was afraid, of course. Who wouldn't be? Riddle's not nicer to his ... minions, you know." Potter responded with a firm nod, his mouth quirking in what surely was a wince.

"I did what had to be done. If I didn't, we'd have died..." Draco Malfoy said, the words coming out of his mouth like purging a poison.

Harry Potter started to speak before he had half collected his thoughts, "But - when you stood there, in front of the Dark Lord, you looked-"

Draco Malfoy was on his feet in the blink of an eye, his wand in his hand pointed directly at - "Who are you? Potter _wasn't there_." Draco growled, his mental shields shuttering his mind from view. Draco only distantly registered the Weasel reaching under the table; Granger raising her wand from the table. They were _irrelevant_.

[a/n: there you go!

Please read and review, for me?

Tell me what you think Draco's major malfunction is... have you figured it out?

Just a fun little twist from your devious author.]


	30. Not-Potter

Potter - _no, don't call him that - that's dangerous. Not-Potter it is then._ \- gestured sharply, a flat hand across his midriff, heading downward - a cutting motion. All extraneous movement stilled, and Draco Malfoy had a moment to think: Not-Potter clearly was used to giving orders, or had stolen _that_ from real-Potter. Still, the ease and familiarity of the gesture spoke multitudes. This wasn't a _new_ thing, then.

Jerking back, Draco realized, with some wonder and a generous dollop of fear - he hasn't drawn a wand. _Shite_. Almost featherlight, Draco Malfoy felt a brush of a mental presence on his shields. Draco Malfoy blinked twice, in some bafflement - _what in Hel's pants is going on?_

Reinforcing his shields with his own mental discipline, Draco Malfoy eyed the not-Potter across from him. He was standing, on his toes - ready for a fight, if not spoiling for one. At the sight, Draco felt himself relaxing, at least a bit. _At least he thinks I can fight him, **whoever** he is..._

The mental presence outside his walls brushed against them - no, _swirled_ against them. For the thoughts spoke of wind, of a crisp breeze below, and a seeker's wind in his hair. What struck Draco was joy - exultation. Draco felt the turn, felt the shift in the wind, buffeted and not blown away by the current. And another, and another. Suddenly, Draco started - suppressing it so quickly his wand didn't move, though his eyes surely dilated - he knew this pattern... he _remembered_ this pattern.

With that thought, he called up a Quiddich game, ages past and gone. Not-Potter knew the game, but that wasn't _quite_ what Draco was looking for. Draco was matching memories, as he and Harry had dueled that day, a flying duel in the sky. Draco Malfoy saw the shift, the difference between the two memories - truly, it was two lads flying side by side.

With a quick, rueful smile - still inside his mind, Draco Malfoy thought, _Only Harry Potter would choose a game watched by a thousand students, to prove his identity._ And yet, it was a sure sign that it was Potter. Anyone rifling through Potter's mind would have found a conversation, something _meaningful_. It took a seeker to understand, and remember the wind.

Draco let his shields slip carefully, leaving just enough room to let the thought slip out to Potter, the fresh memory an easy one to send.

"Still Harry Potter, Malfoy. Just Harry Potter." The words were solid and sure, the steadiness more fitting of Hagrid than the slight, raven-haired boy in front of him.

"How? Why? Were you spying on me?" Of course Potter had been spying on him, Draco thought, a nasty smile in his mind - careful, as always, not to let it spill onto his face. He had been the enemy, after all. But at the Dark Lord's gatherings? That was mere foolhardiness, call it bravery only if you have no other choice.

[a/n: Well, I thought it was obvious. Draco had - out of Harry's own mouth - confirmation that he had been watching a meeting of the Dark Lord's. Obvious conclusion: there's a death eater standing here. Pessimistic conclusion: It's Voldemort standing there. Go with the pessimist's conclusion, and you'll only find happy surprises.

Read and Review, and I swear, Harry eventually gets to ask his question.

Draco's going to get his answered first, because he's the guy with the wand who nearly tried to kill who he thought was the dark lord. (Key Question: Does Harry know that?)]


	31. Mind Magic

Still standing, Potter raised his hand, brushing his hair back. Draco Malfoy found himself staring at that scar. Suddenly, something twisted in his gut, Draco's eyes widening minutely. _Surely not..._ "Marked by the Dark Lord, yes... but better to say linked. Not that I knew it before I started Hogwarts - my mum's sacrifice, or Voldemort simply too not-there to matter?"

Draco Malfoy sprawled himself in his chair, his entire torso slumped sideways across the table (beside his empty teacup), his legs stretched out in the other direction. As loose as a cat, and just as alert - ready at a moment's notice. "This link - what's to stop the Dark Lord from ransacking your mind? Is he looking _right now_?" _This was going to hell in a handbasket,_ Draco Malfoy thought, _I don't care what_ _ **Potter**_ _'s seen - but what's the Dark Lord purloined from his mind? What will he_ _ **steal**_ _next?_

"I can tell when he's looking, it _hurts_..." The look on Potter's face, defiance with a peculiar admixture of stubbornness and pain, was one to be treasured. Later, though.

"Not to mention your scar bleeds." Hermione Granger said.

"Hasn't anyone tried to teach you occulumency?" Draco Malfoy froze, suddenly, as the gears that had been slipping in his mind clicked into place.

 _Snape_ Draco sent towards Potter, his eyes staring coldly, _Snape was teaching you occulumency..._

"Dumbledore tried..." Potter said weakly, with an almost offhanded shrug.

 _It was Snape, don't be ridiculous. Fifth year, am I right?_

 _Dumbledore ordered_ Potter thought, with the stronger emphasis clearly echoing in his words.

 _You asked Hermione to get you the Occulumency books from the Restricted section, right?_

 _She didn't find a single one -_ Oddly enough, this thought they shared together.

 _Potter, I know - I had them all checked out. Madam Pince would have said something to Snape if you had been asking, but Hermione wasn't even supposed to know those books_ _ **exist**_ _._

Malfoy sent an image of himself, in a sunny library perch, with books all around him, looking up to watch the Ravenclaws on the Quiddich pitch.

 _You... checked out_ _ **all**_ _the books? Shite, no wonder it was so hard!_

 _They were interesting,_ Draco Malfoy thought, his memory on girls, as he swiftly sunk a different thought - _I sound just like Granger..._ Draco Malfoy remembered his head falling into his crossed arms at his desk, hard at work on a problem. _I have to fix this, don't i?_ he remember/thought, in tones of exasperation. _Fuck, I was hoping this would be simple. Easy would be a bonus._ _ **Why**_ _is it never simple with you, Potter?_

Potter remembered a Draco shrug of sheer arrogant insouciance. _I suppose I'm just born that way._

Malfoy projected some coordinates into his mind, pulling a detailed map of a cave. "Apparate here, two nights from now, at 7pm. I'll be by when I can. I've got some ideas that should help, but it'll take more time than we havve now to explain. Don't tell your friends, it's safer that way." _Out of nowhere, in Draco's mind, the image of Snape saying, "it's definitely Slytherin to always have a backup plan."_

 _"I'll leave them a note, in case of trouble."_ Potter thought, the phrasing and meaning so foreign to Draco's mind that it was assembled out of two dissimilar pieces. _Salazar's Ghost, this gives me a headache,_ Malfoy thought.

[a/n: heh. Snape comes across better here - failed to plan for Malfoy getting interested in occulumency. And for Potter's own laziness.

Snape's quite good at occulumency, but he's not an expert - he knows one way well, that works for him (and Draco, unsurprisingly).

Up nearly next: Potter and Weasley and Granger make a decision...]


	32. That

Draco fell out of the mindlink, to find everyone looking at him, as he gently settled into his chair, pouring himself a bit of tea. His eyes seemed to flutter, as he looked down at the tea - a strange, nearly flirtatious gesture - entirely inappropriate.

It seemed eons, before Draco Malfoy looked up, swirling his tea in an effortless manner, the result of long practice. "At first, it was easy." His voice was soft, not the full-throated purr that Snape used - softer still, like a whisper but less sibilant. As if he was more talking to himself, and didn't intend anyone to listen. Unnoticed, the three Gryffindors leaned in to hear what he was saying. "Killing, I mean. It was kill or be killed - and my parents would be next to die, if I refused."

"The first death was a punishment, Babcock had gotten too cocky and had nearly been caught sneaking some illegal potions out of one of the apothecaries. The Dark Lord couldn't afford to lose the apothecary's business, as would surely have happened had any of us fingered him." It had not been a quick punishment, of course, Draco thought. Luckily, he was called in at the end... "By the time I stepped into the room, the killing was a mercy. I didn't even spare a thought to my spell not working."

"The second was worse, deliberately I think. A horsefaced muggle girl - no more than two years younger than me at the time. I thought of my mother, of her body as shredded as Babcock had been... I suppose you saw me then, too, Potter." Draco Malfoy made no effort to hide his bitterness, the ire at the deed submerged below the iced fury of his rival witnessing these acts.

"When I saw that old woman - Figg, was it? I knew I couldn't do it."

"You couldn't kill her?"

"No. I couldn't continue drifting like a leaf on the dark waters."

"Oh?" Granger asked, her voice a veritable hum of curiosity.

"I was going to make her death worth something, make it buy something more than the endless death and suspicion and paranoia that consumes Tom Riddle."

"Just that?"

"Just that. A goal in mind, an unfixed path set before me. Planning came later." Draco Malfoy said, thinking _Make of that what you will._

"How much of what you've told me was truthful?" Harry Potter asked.

Draco Malfoy smiled a crooked grin, "Eighty/twenty."

Potter blinked, and shot back, "How much of what you've told Granger has been truthful?"

"One hundred percent." Draco made a soft, audible snort, "she didn't ask about my _feelings_."

Potter spent a moment thinking this through, the thoughts visibly crossing his face ( _about as active a thinker as Greg_ , Malfoy thought wryly). Slowly, he nodded, and said, "That's the last question I can think to ask you. We're going to discuss this now, in private."

"Who knew trusting a Slytherin was such hard work?" Draco Malfoy asked, a faint smile touching his lips. All three Gryffindors gave him a glare that clearly said _troublemaker_.

The three strode off together, almost forcibly saving the discussion until they were behind shields. Draco fought himself to avoid looking for/at his mother. _Don't give away her position; she can take care of herself._

Draco watched with professional interest as they sealed themselves with privacy spells, smiling a bit at the last one - a darkness shield to prevent him from reading body language.

Draco Malfoy crossed his legs again, stretching them out around the table's support. Something was bothering him - the niggling sense that he was missing something fairly important. Closing his eyes, he thought crossly, _give it time, don't rush it..._

[a/n: can you figure out what Draco's missing? There's been plenty of hints.

Now review! (or post your guesses, that works too!)]


	33. In which we monologue

[a/n: those looking for action should skip this one. Draco is looking at a black sphere. It is a very boringly blocked scene]

Draco paused a moment, still half thinking about what memories Potter had brought up. Taking control of his life had been both difficult and charmingly simplistic at the same time. Rising in the Death Eater ranks was all about competency, after all. For a Slytherin, acquiring the necessary secrets and blackmail was child's play. _Potter_ had undoubtedly seen that as well, seen him standing beside the Dark Lord as Death Eaters were humiliated or tortured, and often killed. Oh, Draco Malfoy wasn't in the Inner Circle, but that was politics - since his father was still alive, there wouldn't be a second Malfoy trusted so highly.

But no matter the people he had in hand, no matter the books he purloined, he couldn't find a single way to buy or bribe or steal his freedom. Draco found himself wondering if his godfather had tried - was _still_ trying? It was a troubling thought, and like so many he had had today, he stuffed it in a box and forgot about it. It wasn't like he meant to be remembering these thoughts after today, after all. Draco seethed, thinking, _This was going to be so easy! Just put a note in the mneumonic book, and forget about all of this! But nooo-ooo-ooo..._ _Potter has to ruin everything, and isn't that just typical?_

Malfoy wracked his brains, worried at the problem, trying to come up with some simple, nigh-undetectable way to explain to himself that he needed to meet Potter for occlumency lessons. _Assuming the Dark Lord doesn't just eavesdrop on Potter's miniscule mind._ Shaking his head, Draco Malfoy thought, _It doesn't matter, it'll be over with soon enough. Now, the strategy..._ Draco straightened abruptly in his chair. He had it - it wasn't perfect, but it would do. **_The eyes are the windows to the soul, for friend and enemy alike._**

His mind eased, Malfoy began to consider the myriad ways of teaching Potter occlumency. Well, the first question was how to arrange the meetings. If at all possible, Draco wanted to avoid actually _seeing_ Potter, as difficult as that would be considering he had to see Potter's eyes. Polyjuice? There would have to be some coherent explanation, just in case Riddle decided to delve into his mind... That would work, so long as they could find a place to meet. Malfoy rather disliked holes in his memory, anyway - even when they were absolutely necessary. It was a quite aggravating sensation, the idea that he was missing something he _ought to know_.

Before Draco could follow his stray thought on Phoenix Song, the dark bubble shattered, and the Golden Trio strode out together.

[a/n: Draco's original note? _She said yes._ Short, sweet, and should Voldemort catch him looking at it, he'd simply have to invent a secret betrothal to Pansy - which the crafty witch would stick to, as she'd been briefed earlier.

Draco's a crafty one, no?

Yes, Draco Malfoy does know how to occlude. A prudent person doesn't assume that he knows everything, and plans for the worst case contingency, which is Riddle penetrating his mental defenses thoroughly.

Read and Review, folks. Please send in guesses as to what Draco's missed.].


	34. The Vote

From between - and slightly in front of the two lumps behind her, Granger announced, "Vote's two to one, we'll go with your plan." Granger smiled a genuine smile. _Great- the fool's gambit worked,_ Malfoy thought rather acidly.

Unexpectedly, a few pieces fell together in Malfoy's mind. _Granger's lying... if they had just been arguing, they wouldn't have come out like that._ Malfoy went over to the table, to pick up some tea, taking the moment to look at them. _No, they aren't pretending solidarity, they've got it, solid and true._ "Alright. I'll do what I can to avoid unnecessary suffering on my end. I know which Death Eaters have boneyards in their closets - and which have Elephants' Graveyards." Draco saw Granger's mouth quirk at the reference. Some people gloried in their killing; worshiped the bloodlust- and others, well, their secrets were darker and less Dionysian. The screams that haunted their closets were often their own.

 _Shite. They want me to believe it..._ Malfoy thought, as he absentmindedly fiddled with Weasley's paper, noting without a scrap of surprise that the bubble-conversation wasn't recorded on it. "Just remember, the Malfoys own the Daily Prophet - don't believe anything you read without solid proof."

 _Fooled by a Weasley, for land's sake! Consarn it, I need to find a new nickname._ Draco couldn't resist sitting down, his tea the only thread restraining himself from crossing his arms in a fit of pique. Slytherins had a sly sense of humor - one that held the promise of the sharp edge of their tongues, slicing so close armhair falls to the ground in their wake. _It was only funny when Weasel seemed incapable of doing anything devious._ Suppressing a frown, Draco Malfoy thoughts raced. _Dodo? He's certainly that foolhardy. Cupid? Nah, that strikes a little to close for comfort - better not give him any ideas, either._ Draco's thoughts leaped and frolicked, falling on an idea and savaging it like a crazed wolf - only to leap to the next idea, as unceasingly hungry as Fenrir himself.

Draco set the problem aside for the moment, mentally brushing against Potter's mind. As Potter's mind linked with his, Draco thought in a somber tone, "When all's said and done, if you must hate someone, hate me." The brutally cold words were something he had said to pansy, and the memory did not cut off before they both saw her pained face smooth into porcelain uncaringness again.

Draco Malfoy felt a sense of creeping dread along his nerves - it was a memory of sneaking around the dungeons, the ever-present threat of Prof. Snape seeming especially close that day, no doubt because of the poison that he had tucked in a pocket. _Potter's feelings..._ Draco interpreted.

"After all, I'm used to it." memory-Draco had been laughing with Zambini about girls. "Hatred's like" - part of a discussion on ethics with his father, "a fine wine, so many subtle variations." - Draco had been ten when he had said that, swirling a bit of grape juice in a purloined wine glass, striving to impress Zambini.

"Before I forget..." memory-Draco's eyes sparkled with amusement - he had been teasing Astoria about her Christmas present, insinuating that he had perhaps forgotten (as if he really would!). Draco was just as amused now, as a matter of fact. Swiftly, he revealed the newly-present memory of Snape's words to both himself and Granger.

As Potter's eyes sparkled... _with hate? certainly with intent fury..._ Draco knew he had made a terrible mistake. _Best to not try to fix it_ Draco thought rather morosely.

Putting the thought aside, Draco returned to the question of Ron the Former Weasel. After a few moments thought, Draco had it.

"If you two will excuse us, I need Granger for a bit to give marching orders. She'll be back before nightfall." Draco stood up, and bowed, saying, "Potter, McDonald - good luck. If you see me on the field of battle, shoot to kill. I'll return the favor."

Draco had to admit, the confounded look the two boys shared was worth the effort of coming up with a new nickname. Weasley puffed himself up, and spat, "You too, ferret. Shoot to kill." _Seems like he's still upset with me. Keyword: seems._ _I can tell you don't get the joke, Weasley. And you're wracking your brain to figure out what it is._ Harry Potter simply nodded crisply, and gave Draco Malfoy a wide grin, waving, before he apparated away - the grin didn't hide a bit of the fury in his eyes. _Slipping a bit? Maybe you fools really do trust me._

[a/n: Okay, so I promised myself I'd have a nice explanation of what Draco's been up to, for anyone who's been feeling lost, and that I'd put it after the epilogue.

This isn't about Draco, though - it's about Ron. Ron's basically been playacting this entire scene - he's been using the time to study Draco (relatively unobserved - notice how Ron basically completely fell out of consideration?), and pick up anything that Granger and Potter have missed. I hope you're surprised, and that you like!

Yep, Potter's viewpoint of this conversation is rather intriguing, isn't it? (That's five more reviews, if you want it.)

Drop me a review if you want to listen to them giving marching orders - I don't intend to do more than briefly summarize that.

Two more chapters before the epilogue, so please read and review! Reviews remind me to write more on this story, and not simply start a new one...]


	35. Lie with the Truth

[a/n: reread the last chapter if you're reading this when posted. I made significant changes]

The afterimage of Potter and McDonald had barely faded before Hermione Granger let out a sudden peal of bell-like laughter. "You called him Ronald McDonald!" Hermione at last gasped, still only partially mastering her laughter.

Draco Malfoy allowed himself a small, smug smile. "And you lied to me." The words spilled out smoothly, as Granger straightened. Staring at the open admiration in his face, Granger could not hide the flash of unfeigned surprise in her warm eyes.

She smiled slightly, and said, "You noticed."

"Eventually. Shall we get started?"

"Of course."

Prof. McGonagall was first, her eyes narrowing and her mouth pursing at the sight of her two former students together, in such an obviously inhospitable place. Her face scarcely changed as they explained the plan. At some point, she crossed her arms. "Will you vow to aid us in this endeavor?" Granger said urgently. A crisp nod was all the answer that was needed.

Nott was next, his face paling even worse than normal, as he saw Granger standing beside Draco Malfoy. To a Gryffindor, he'd look inscrutable, but Draco Malfoy could see the blue haze of cursing in his eyes. Nott certainly knew that nothing ordinary would have Granger and Malfoy standing side by side. "You know why you're here, don't you?" Draco Malfoy said, deliberately strolling around Nott, forcing him to pivot until Granger was at his back. "We need your help."

"Why should I help you?" Lupin asked, his voice hostile as a growling wolf.

"I have nothing to offer you." Draco Malfoy said, pausing a moment, and then two, "Granger, however... there's still children out there, hiding in the woods, unsure of what they were last night. With your help, we can end this war. After the war, we can make a true peace." Draco's mouth briefly softened, as he caught sight of Granger visibly suppressing the need to ask questions.

After Lupin had left, Draco Malfoy merely shrugged, and said, "You'd have offered it to him anyway, and it's a wise thing to put on the table. You'll note I didn't specify a timeframe." Draco Malfoy's grin was positively wolfish... and smug.

Two dozen people to talk to - a baker's dozen, with one apiece held in reserve. Draco Malfoy ached by the end of it, the tenseness of a trying day wearing on even his genteel demeanor.

"Is that it?" Granger asked, yawning as she netted her hands together and reached for the sky - lifting her breasts in the process, her back arching in a most telling way.

"Almost. There's one more wizarding tradition, to seal the deal." Draco Malfoy said, as he stepped firmly toward Hermione Granger. A part of him half expected her to shrink back, but the rest of him was quite gratified when she held her ground - no doubt not wanting to seem a coward.

With a quirk of his mouth, Draco Malfoy bent over Granger, and kissed her. Not a sloppy kiss, nor a perfunctory one - a thorough, firm planting of lips upon lips. A moment later, he stepped back, and said, "Have fun looking that up, Mudblood." Without pausing a beat, Draco Malfoy spun and disapparated.

Wide-eyed, Hermione Granger stood there baffled, staring almost unseeing at Narcissa Malfoy, whose face was pursed into a moue of shock, her two fingers held to her lips - for a moment, before she too apparated.

[a/n: Well, folks, that's a wrap! Lengthy, interesting Epilogue to follow, and then a "Hufflepuff's guide to Slytherins" for anyone who really thinks they missed half the story.

And yes, Draco Malfoy is a romantic son of a bitch!

Read and review, folks! This is my first story that I've managed to finish, and I'd love to get some feedback.

... also, for quite a few more reviews (say have the total reviews hit 50 for this story), i may be tempted to write a sequel. If you're wondering why I'm putting it off, it's because I've got a different idea vying for "Draco and Hermione at the Ministry after the War"]


	36. Epilogue: Part 1

It took Harry Potter three days before he broke Malfoy's confidence. Those that knew him well would have been surprised he lasted that long.

For three days, Potter's eyes had burned like green emeralds, the suspicion in them shining out like a malevolent force. Most of the Gryffindors had mistaken it for shrewdness, or cunning - they were unused to unvoiced suspicion. Zambini breathed a silent sigh of relief when he saw Potter's face change into that resolved, determined face he was used to. He hadn't known what had upset Potter - whether it had been the battle, or something afters. But, of all things, Zambini hadn't expected Potter to hole up in the library with Hermione Granger. _Was he planning?_ Zambini thought querulously - or, as hard as it was to believe, was he actually furious with Granger, _of all people?_

Looking up from the neverending pile of books, Hermione had known on sight trouble was coming - Harry's face was like a battering ram, a physical force of anger as he strode into the library. Mentally, she breathed a sigh of relief as he started the sequence of spells for privacy - watching him carefully, not because she figured he'd miscast, but merely because the strength of the spells would give her some indication as to what he wanted to discuss. Spells for howls, for roars, for whispers and for magic itself... _Angry Harry, then_ , Hermione thought.

It was a furious Harry Potter that paced the room like a caged beast - Hermione knew better than to say a word. "Why didn't you TELL me?" Potter burst out at last.

"Tell me what?" Hermione advanced cautiously - it wasn't like she was keeping buckets of things from him, but there were myriad items of little consequence that were rarely discussed.

"You know what!" Harry's green eyes glared at her balefully, the fires of rage stoked nearly to the point of boiling. "Tell me that Snape was there - what he had to say!"

"What?" Hermione looked visibly startled, "But - how?"

" _Malfoy_ told me-" Harry growled, "since you didn't think it _important_."

Gulping, Hermione Granger took a moment to steady her nerves. "It would have been _distracting_. And I know there's no love lost between you two."

"What's been distracting is that you've been hiding it from me! That you didn't trust me to do what was _necessary_!" Harry Potter's stewing and sulking had burst forth in a frothy mess of anger and frustration.

"You don't even know what was necessary, Mister Harry James Potter!" Hermione Granger snapped back.

"Then why don't you tell me!?" Harry Potter was back to exasperation again. Joy.

"We needed another set of eyes." Hermione said.

"So you trust him? Severus Snape? Are you quite mad?" Harry Potter laughed, a cold and bitter laugh that got hollower as it went.

[Well, as you might have guessed it, I am going to be doing the epilogue in a few short chapters.

Read and Review while I tie up loose ends.]


	37. Epilogue, Part 2

"It's not like his life will be in any more danger than it would have been already." Hermione bristled, her mouth opening

-Potter cut her off, "What makes you think I care one whit whether he lives or dies?"

"Harry," Hermione's brown eyes stared at him steadily. "I've known you for how long, now? Seven years? You're angry at him - and Harry? You don't get angry with people _you don't care about_!"

Harry Potter stiffened, his feet starting to pace before he really thought about it. Hermione was right. She was always right, but she was really right about this. Harry, however, refused to acknowledge that she was right. "You didn't trust me!" he snapped instead.

"It wasn't a matter of trust" Hermione Granger said calmly, lying with the truth - as always. "He would have been a distraction, that's all."

"A Distraction?! From what?" Harry yelled, the words echoing around the sound-proofed room.

"From figuring out whether you could trust Draco Malfoy. They weren't working together, you know."

"How, exactly, do you know that?" Potter snapped.

"Snape tried to hex us - unprompted." Granger said with a tightening of the lips that was a concealed smile.

"What, exactly, did you do to cause that?!" It was almost _unthinkable_ to see Snape lose control - though often irate, he was nearly always content to use words. Even with Sirius Black - and Potter had thought Snape _liked_ Draco...

"Me? I did nothing - you should know me better than that!" Hermione giggled, something that made Harry Potter want to throw something at her for not taking any of this seriously.

"Malfoy, on the other hand - well, what would you do if you were teleported to a strange location, and then frozen for G-d knows how long?"

"Wait... Malfoy was behind ... the kidnappings..." Potter said, feeling a headache stalking him behind all his anger. "No wonder everyone's been appearing..." Potter took another pace away from Hermione, and then whirled back, "Wait, _that's_ why he wanted you to _**stay**_ , isn't it?" Hermione gave a small nod.

"You can see why 'decide if you can trust him' was an important issue." Granger said, and Potter nodded reluctantly.

"Were you ever going to tell me what Snape said?"

"How do - how in hell did you know about that?" Granger said, starting - papers flying everywhere, as she quieted with a startled look on her face. "He didn't- You didn't-"

[a/n: ahh, the powers of Gryffindors to take any conversation and have it at full volume - and nigh incomprehensibly. Promise after we're done with this short conversation, the Slytherins will be back.

Read and review folks!]


	38. Epilogue, Part 3

For a moment, Harry Potter looked at his best friend blankly. Then, he spent three more moments looking confused. Hermione was treated to a moment of dawning comprehension - and then Harry Potter looked **_guilty_**. _The hell?_ She thought, her mind working in overdrive to figure out what, exactly, he had done. Well, and _somehow_ managed to keep all fingers and toes attached - perhaps she ought to check with Snape, he might be missing a couple.

"I-" Harry said, and broke off, his face looking uncertain (and still half guilty). "Shite, I wasn't supposed to tell you" Potter growled, his pacing back and double-time. "It's just I couldn't take it-"

"Take what?" Hermione asked, her curiousity getting the better of that sinking feeling in the bottom of her stomach.

"You - not trusting me. Not telling me anything. We're friends, right? That means... not keeping things from each other!" Harry said this quietly - as if all the fight had drained out of him. It was that, far more than his words, that made Hermione pale.

"Of course we're friends, Harry! And that means looking out for each other - even when we make mistakes. I'm sorry," Hermione said, though she really wasn't, "I should have told you that Snape was there." Looking down, she said quietly, "I think that message he had was for me."

"What do you think he meant?" Harry Potter said, his pacing suddenly soft and relaxed.

"That he wasn't _just_ acting on Tom's orders, of course."

"But three sets of orders?" Harry said, his green eyes pleading for Hermione to _understand_ \- and pretty please make it comprehensible for everyone else.

Hermione shrugged, and said softly, "He was the head of House Slytherin - are you surprised?" And now that Harry Potter thought of it, he really, really wasn't.

Hermione's brown eyes faced Harry's levelly, as she said, "He's plotting something - and he's not entirely loyal to Tom Riddle."

"You can't really believe that!" Harry said, throwing up his hands - his anger finding an outlet.

"If he had really been loyal to Riddle, he would have simply tried to kill me. I was standing there with Draco Malfoy - remember? Death Eater, nearly in the Inner Circle?"

Harry shook his head, in confusion, "No, that would have been the right move anyway - Draco Malfoy would hardly care if you lived or died, remember?" Frowning, Harry Potter continued, "So why didn't he?"

Hermione Granger tented her fingers in front of her face, before she straightened suddenly, "He can smell a plot from miles away. And we looked like a unified front."

"And he answered your question in front of Malfoy..."

"Yes, but incompletely..."

"Either he doesn't trust Draco, or he's trying to compartmentalize things." Harry said, frowning.

"Then he wanted to tell me that he's still on our side," Hermione let out a snort, "Or at least not on Riddle's."

"And that there's at least one more player in the game - probably someone we haven't accounted for."

"So keep our eyes open." Hermione said, her eyes sparkling. "Now, Harry, just what was it you were saying about not keeping secrets from friends?"

Harry had the grace to blush, and say softly, "I promised I wouldn't tell. But... now you know. I was talking with Draco Malfoy using legimency - mind to mind."

"And he didn't want you to tell me?" Hermione said softly, promptingly.

"No, as best as I can figure, he didn't want us depending on it - or using it in an emergency."

"He's right, so far as that goes. You should have told me earlier, though, Harry..." Hermione said, saying it more for form than because she believed it. "We're friends - you can trust me to not build a strategy around something completely unreliable, even if _Malfoy_ doesn't!"

Harry Potter couldn't help himself, he burst out laughing, and laughed loud and long.

Read, and send me a review!]


	39. Epilogue, Part 4

Two nights later, Harry Potter found himself, clad in an all-concealing cloak, apparating to Malfoy's given coordinates, hoping to hell he remembered them well enough to not get splinched. Standing there for a moment, he reviewed his preparations - he had a portkey, and Hermione knew exactly when to send her Patronus if things did not go well. He truly didn't feel like Malfoy would betray him - why was that, he silently wondered? Was he relying on Malfoy's guilt? With a shake of his head, he thought, no, it won't be that, never. His ears pricked for any untoward noise - Malfoy might have been followed, after all, he shrugged and crept to the cave's dark mouth.

Inside, it was darkness - and Potter crept into it, step by uncertain step - wondering if when his eyes adjusted, he'd see anything at all. "You're as loud as a cow, boy." Malfoy's silvery drawl spun out of the darkness - not close, and not far, slightly echoing.

"Yes, sir." Harry Potter responded, taking the role of student with no good grace, and more than a trace of hostility.

Malfoy lit his wand with a muttered spell, it barely illuminated the black robes they each were wearing - and their eyes, of course - glinting out of the hoods. Human transfiguration - wolves eyes, at least on Harry Potter's part. He didn't know what Malfoy had picked.

"Have you heard of the Phoenix's Song, boy?" Malfoy asked briskly.

"No, but I think I may have heard it..." Harry Potter said, thinking back to Fawkes' redgold plumage as he sat on Harry's head.

"It's a technique you may be rather good at, I suspect. They did always praise your single-mindedness, didn't they?" The briskly cold voice continued, as Harry looked at those silver-green eyes.**

"Go on." Harry fought to sound disinterested, but suspected he had failed - until he heard Draco Malfoy's rough chuckle. Then he _knew_ he had failed.

"It's rather like getting a song stuck in your head - you listen to the song, and you let everything -sight, sound - even thoughts, fade away."

Harry nodded, before realizing that it was entirely invisible within the cloak. "Yes sir."

"And then you let the song itself fall away - until you only have a single note in your head."

"I...I think I could _do_ that." Harry Potter considered. _This sounds a lot easier than Snape's method. Probably why Draco chose it - wants something I can learn fast and well._

"Consider, before you attempt it - it is a dangerous method to shield your mind."

"How is it dangerous?"

"There's no way you can find your way back. Not without help." Draco Malfoy's smile was evident in his voice, if not reflected in his invisible face.

"Oh?" Potter said, promptingly.

"The song's the key. If you leave open only the path that the song weaves in your mind, it's the only way your mind can be penetrated. So long as your opponent doesn't know the song - or even think to use it, you remain shielded. Completely. But without the song, your mind will remain in that state until you die."

"You don't actually _want_ me to use this!" Potter said accusingly, if devoid of harshness.

"It's a failsafe - a backup. Other methods may work - this one _will_ work."

Harry Potter found he couldn't argue with that, "I'll need to learn it then."

"Yes, you will." Draco Malfoy paused, and his voice seemed to grin, as he said quickly, "Let me choose the tune." A parchment unrolled itself, and Draco Malfoy's quicksilver tenor began to sing.

**Harry's are gold, for what it's worth. Side effect of the transfiguration.

[a/n: And it's time. Well, see you next week - write a review, I love 'em! If you particularly enjoy writing uncomplementary lyrics about Harry Potter, send 'em to me!]


	40. Epilogue, Part 5

Harry Potter's eyes widened at the lyrics... _And I thought Weasley is our King was horrid!_ By the time the blond was done singing, Harry's face had curled into a frown, "Is there a reason you chose those lyrics?"

"Of course." Malfoy's eyes looked carefully blank - almost suspiciously so, considering his voice was nearly glowing with delight, "Needs to be something the Death Eaters'll sing. Something catchy, to boot." He rested his chin on his hands, before continuing, "So, how'd I do?"

"Well, it's memorable, to say the least..." Harry started carefully.

"Good, then that's settled!"

"Do I really have to learn that song?" Harry Potter whinged.

"You could be put anywhere, in any dungeon or cage. You could be abandoned, discarded as a worthless shell. I won't be responsible for leaving you like that. And I really can't _guarantee_ that I'll find you. Besides, it'd be easier for me to free you from your mental cage, if everyone's singing that blasted song!" Draco ended his words with a throaty chuckle. _He really is quite proud of this one, isn't he?_

"Very well," Harry Potter said.

They sat down to work, Harry descending into the song, painting his entire mental landscape black, and seeing the glowing silver notes on the black background. _This really is loads easier than emptying my mind,_ Harry thought with a mental grin.

"Have you got the first part, yet?" Malfoy inquired.

Harry nodded, saying, "It's amazing how easy it is to concentrate on just one thing."

"It's why you're good at Quiddich. Concentration, focus, determination. But that's the easy part. Now, you need to start paring the song down - even as I keep singing. Try to focus on a measure." Harry's face creased at that, unnoticed by Malfoy under Potter's concealing hood. "Or a word, or even a note. Let it play over and over in your head, until it's the only part of the song you hear."

It took Harry five tries to even remember not to think of the next word - and seven more before he was _successfully_ blocking it out of his head. "Almost" Harry said, wiping metaphorical sweat from his brow.

Malfoy's eyes tightened, as his impatience began to show thorough - his voice still crystal clear, if slightly rougher (it was getting tired).

 _There_! Harry thought, as he managed to capture his name in his head - and then thousands of memories rushed in, completely engulfing the music. Gripping his robe, he strove for balance. _Better choose a different word._

As Harry nestled into the song again, his ears caught on a fragment, " _His rampant disregard for dignity, propriety, the very law itself! He won't be killed by the Dark Lord - he'll just kill himself! With Basilisks and Dragons, mermaids and werewolves! He's the very definition of a fool, however fast he moves!"_

 _Rampant_ , Harry thought, his mind turning it over, enjoying the stamp-step of the word.**

"Once more." Harry said firmly, and he thought he caught Draco's mouth clap tight on words of protest. Putting his hands behind his back, the silvery song poured forth - only slightly roughened for all the singing.

Harry's mind was painted with the word, and he let the second syllable fade as it charged around the room. Finally, Harry was only hearing the "A" - the loud note at its purest. Then his vision seemed to completely glow.

Harry woke to find himself in a somewhat amusing (if you weren't him) position, looking up at Draco Malfoy's hidden face. _Huh? How am I kneeling in front of him?_ Harry scrambled upward, as Draco Malfoy said, "Looks like it works. You didn't even manage to die."

"Surely you aren't planning to sing this for all the Death Eaters? A recital in front of Tom?" Harry said, with a grin.

"That would be a Gryffindor thing to do." Malfoy said with a snort, all false offended honor, "I'll sing it for a few people with an ear for music - Daphne, Millie - even Vince, if you can believe it. I'll let them spread the word." Harry nodded, still trying to process Crabbe being good at... well, anything at all - let alone the light and airy humor it would take to sing this song well.

"Be careful around Snape, Malfoy. I'm not sure you can trust him." Harry said, in way of parting.

Harry could have sworn he heard a true smile in Draco Malfoy's voice, as he said, "Trust no one, it's much safer that way."

**Rampant is really quite trochaic, although _of course_ Harry Potter's never learned rhyme nor meter.

[a/n: Review? Hermione's going to be getting out of her "I have a new Library" buzz... in another couple weeks. Meanwhile, unnoticed, Harry's going to finish learning some more traditional occulumency. But you don't want to read about that, do you? It's rather boring. Got at least another two or three chapters for the epilogue.]


	41. Epilogue, the continuing

Hermione Granger wasn't _nearly_ as oblivious as Harry Potter thought, even when she was completely absorbed in investigating a whole new library. She knew that he'd been _wandering off_ recently... She was just biting her tongue, and waiting until he decided to tell her. She knew that he was expected to be out - and that they should worry if he wasn't back in two hours. Planned meeting? It had been enough for her to occupy herself, for weeks, whenever she needed a break. She had it currently at 75%, "sneaking out to see girlfriend (nearly certainly Gin Weasley)", and 25%, "something else (possibly Draco Malfoy - for whatever ineffable reason)." Having resolved the issue was the _problem_ , though, not the solution. It was no longer something interesting to play around with.

For the past few days, she had been pondering the mystery that was Draco Malfoy - finding, and discretely collecting books on law as she pored over both the Malfoy and Black libraries. They were sitting right there, and she longed to open one of them, to lose herself in the abtruse wording and serpentine logic. Shaking her head, she told herself sternly, _You don't have time for that_. And suddenly she sat up straight, springing to her feet in her haste. _I know exactly what I_ _ **do**_ _have time for!_

* * *

Blaise Zambini looked up as Hermione Granger burst into the study, her hair (as usual) frizzed out to the size of a small housecat **- and her eyes sparkling. Looking up, he simply cocked his head to one side, attentively listening. He wasn't terribly surprised at her appearance - it looked like the Granger had a shiny idea again. As she thrust the door closed, she hurriedly threw up enough anti-eavesdropping wards to handle an army. _Not that it was at all impractical, with the Twins around._

"Blaise!" she said with a merry grin, "You were friends with Draco Malfoy in school, right?"

Instantly, his admittedly guarded expression shuttered closed, into a blank mask, "As much as anyone was, in Slytherin." _Treading the line a little close, aren't we? No one had friends in Slytherin._

"Then you can explain him to me." Granger stated firmly, an implacable look in her eyes. _What the **hell** is this about? What in blue **blazes** requires her to know about Malfoy, of all people?_

Curiosity sparking inside him - along with a surprisingly strong need to know _what_ was going _on_ , Blaise simply nodded.

"I met with Draco Malfoy a few weeks ago..." Granger said, trailing off - Blaise bit back a smile, as he twigged on, _She hasn't thought out a single thing she's saying, has she? Delightfully foolish, these Gryffindors._ "He had some surprising things to say."

"Oh?" Blaise asked mildly, forcing himself to remain leaning back, relaxed and casual. _A few weeks ago, and she's only asking me now? What the hell? Does she not trust me? Did she really not put **any** more thought into this after talking with Draco Malfoy? Here I thought all the Gryff's considered him the devil incarnate - and not without reason, I might add. She's not speaking with suspicion, though. Frustration, sounds more like it..._

"I made a bargain with him, in exchange for access to the Malfoy library." _So that's where she's been getting all those dark books she's been reading. I had been wondering..._

"What? Do you have _any_ idea how _dangerous_ that is? Riddle might show up at any point!" Blaise said, his eyes cold and his voice hard, masking any _feelings ***_ behind icy anger.

"I was briefed. There are plans in place, and backup plans." Granger said shortly, her eyes still sparkling.

"So? If you don't need to vet his words, what do you need?" Blaise said.

"An explanation." Granger bit out, and then said, breathlessly, "I haven't even told Ron or Harry, so I will know if you squeal. What's said here stays here."

"Am I a Slytherin, or not?" Blaise said with an easy smile.

**yes, I have that hair. I keep it braided.

***Friendship, concern, cameraderie, that sort of thing.


	42. Epilogue, Part 7

Still smirking, Blaise looked at Granger, who twisted her hands, before speaking. "It was right before I left. He said something - did something most peculiar."

"Still surprised when a Slytherin does something unexpected?" Blaise countered, knowing before he spoke that he was buying her time.

Instead of taking the time, Granger just broke - stamping her foot indignantly as she said, "You'd have been surprised too - just tell me if you're not!" _And there's that Gryffindor bravery, sparked up just enough to tell me the truth._

Hermione paced away three paces, turning around, and looking down at Blaise, who was still relaxing in the chair, " We were almost done, really, and - and - He said, and I quote, 'There's one more wizarding tradition, to seal the deal.' " Blaise eyed her gently, curiously, wonderingly.

Hermione took two sharp, determined strides towards him, and then bent over him, until Blaise was starting to seriously consider pressing himself into the cushions. Her voice emerged in a harsh, determined whisper, " _and then he kissed me._ " Blaise was startled enough to widen his eyes, his pupils widening as his thoughts whirled into the teeth of a shredding wind. _Draco-He didn't-!_ Before he could wrestle any of his thoughts to the ground, Hermione grinned with malicious delight, "And then, he says - and I do quote, 'Have fun looking that up, Mudblood.' "

Blaise's thoughts froze, for a brief second, as he smiled that flirtatious smile everyone at Hogwarts had seen from him at least once, "I would hardly deprive you of the pleasure of the discovery, my lady." _In for a penny, in for a pound._

Hermione stomped her foot, and said crossly, "If you'd just tell me where to look!"

"The library. I'd think that would be obvious." Blaise said, and suddenly a few things started to click. _Draco, you are a magnificent bastard._

With an audible sniff and her nose in the air, Hermione stormed off, having lost half the clues due to her anger. **

In her wake, Blaise was surprisingly pensive, pondering two things - what the hell had happened to his friend to inspire such... implausible actions, and why the hell didn't the Gryffindors trust him? He didn't bother wondering why Draco didn't trust him - that was obvious. They had never trusted each other, despite being friends (or as close as you might find in Slytherin House). A Gryffindor made a better promise than a Slytherin, any day. Blaise shook his head, dismissing all his cares and worries. _Draco clearly didn't want her to figure it out **too quickly**. How entertaining! __And, of course I won't be telling the Gryffindors. They'd yell and scream - and, **worst** of all - they might spoil the fun!_

**she did notice Blaise's surprise. The others lie mainly within his lack of screaming at her about meeting Mr. Draco Malfoy, noted Death Eater.

[a/n: Blaise doesn't know exactly what's going on, but he's got the gist. And he's playing on Draco's team, in case that's not obvious.

Does this chapter shed some light on what the hell Draco did?

Next chapter's Granger and Potter again - storm und drang.

I do so love reviews!]


	43. The Funeral

Molly Weasley's funeral was the one place Hermione Granger wanted to be the least. And that included being right up in Voldemort's grill - she could fight him, at least, even if she'd probably die. Sitting here, surrounded by mourners - and it wasn't just Molly's brood, either. The entire Order was here (well, save Snape, but he'd never been one for funerals, anyway, even aside from his supposed traitor status) - and what seemed like dozens of people Hermione didn't even recognize - when prompted, they'd simply reply "A neighbor" or "classmate"... Molly's ability to connect with people seemed extraordinary to Hermione, who had never been quite good at it herself. Everyone milled around, comforting each other with their presence - and Hermione felt more awkward than she had ever felt in her life. She reflected, _This is what happens when you attend a funeral you caused._

Tears on his face, Arthur spoke kind and gentle words about his loved wife, telling everyone how much of a strength she had been for them all, through everything. Hermione's nails dug into her clenched fist, as she reassured herself, _He doesn't know - how could he know?_ Bill spoke, and then Ron - even Percy had slunk in, head low, and said quietly, "She loved me, despite everything."

This was what she had done. This was her penance. She repeated those words to herself, as a sort of mantra.

Hermione knew she wasn't the only one not shedding a tear - Harry was dry beside her, another close friend of the family. The twins looked lost without grins on their faces - and tears from them would only remind everyone of their normally false ones anyway. The somberness on their faces said enough for everyone, anyway. Carefree Charlie was crying, as he put a clod of dirt on his mother's grave. Ron had tears running down his cheeks, to absolutely no one's surprise. Fleur - whom Molly had been an absolute beast to, ages back - was crying as well.

As the last mourners left, Hermione could only think, _It had been so easy..._ She could see it so easily in her head, the strychnine that she had put in the sugar - Molly as an early riser would always be first for tea, and she always took two teaspoonfuls. The screams had torn at Molly's throat as she died - unfortunately, she hadn't scattered the sugar, so Hermione had been forced to do that herself (in falsified panic, it was possible to do many things. And few expected the sureness of decision that Harry Potter generally showed out of Hermione Granger the Library Mouse). Zambini had done the tests, the autopsy, right at the kitchen table in Grimmauld Place. He had looked for all sorts of potions, spells, hexes... but before he did more, he had quickly glanced at Hermione, who had softly shaken her head no. He _knew_ , Hermione had realized at that moment, and he was helping to cover it up. Still, it was clear that it wasn't an easy death - and the mutterings about the unnaturalness of it had only grown over time. Hermione had been glad that they had set it aside for the funeral, but she knew the suspicion would not simply go away. A few more weeks, she thought wryly, until Harry Potter can topple Voldemort. Give or take a few months. It had been why she had acted when she did, after all - Molly was one of the least touchable people on the list - **never** on the front lines. The devil take the Order and its suspicion! The martial camaraderie would endure long enough.

As she turned to leave, Harry Potter enveloped her in a bearhug, as she instinctively jumped, and then even more instinctively leaned in to the hug. "Harry!" she squeaked, and then with a low bark of a laugh, "You scared me!"

"I know, I'm sorry." Harry Potter said without any of his usual humor. He leaned in close, his lips less than an inch from her ear, "It was you, wasn't it?"

Hermione fought to not stiffen, to not react - but then she heard the cold certainty in her best friend's voice. "Yeah," she replied quietly, devoutly hoping she wasn't making a mistake, and very very aware of being caught within his arms, unable to escape if things went wrong - and they could go very wrong.

Harry's first response was his arms tightening around Hermione (which did not comfort, only escalate her fear). "God, Hermione! I'm so sorry..."

Hermione's voice, when it emerged muffled from where she had buried her mouth on her shoulder, was hesitant, "You're not angry?"

"Of course I'm angry!" Harry growled, "I'm not sure who to kill first..." Hermione could nearly feel Harry thrumming with energy around her - it wasn't a comfortable feeling.

Harry continued, "But... I'm not _dealing_ with **that** right now. I've been a really shitty friend, leaving you alone to deal with this." Hermione's breath came out in a soft whuffle, as Harry pleaded, "Let me be here for you."

Hermione straightened slightly, her face looking into Harry's earnest expression. "We should go someplace else. Someplace quiet - just to talk." Harry gave a small nod, and then Hermione apparated them away.

When they both had gotten done stumbling, and then laughing at their clumsiness, Hermione's face saddened. They were at her parents' former house. Or, perhaps more accurately, Hermione thought pedantically, her former parents' former house.

[a/n: I love epilogues - we're skipping merrily through the timeline! Switching settings so I can switch to Harry's POV, mostly. Like it or hate it, say you'll write a review!

And look-a chapter that's almost a thousand words!]


	44. Memento Mori

Hermione quietly led Harry up to her room, now completely spare - save the bed and closet, it was undecorated - almost hauntingly so. Harry sat on the bed, and Hermione began to wring her hands, starting to pace. Silently, Harry patted the bed, waiting until Hermione stopped and sat before saying a thing. She was obviously nervous, and he _tried_ to gentle his voice as he seethed with spare anger. "How long?" He asked quietly.

"I didn't know it was going to be me - not at first. And, really, it could have been anyone in the Order. But, anytime I'd look at Ron's face - at Fred's - at Ginny's; I wasn't going to give the task to someone else. Let someone else share the blame." Hermione said, and Harry fought to keep the shock from his face - _it hadn't been just her, then? What was going on?!_

Despite wanting very dearly to punch something - to destroy something, Harry kept his voice even, "That is so _you_ \- you know that, right?" Hermione looked up, as if she still couldn't believe that her best friend was taking her side. "You're always taking the hard tasks." He _hadn't_ been there for her (which made him very angry at himself), because she hadn't _let_ him be there for her (which made him very angry at her). [Harry's Problem wasn't that he didn't know why he was angry. He did know exactly why he was angry, and that made the anger harder to control.] She had done this alone. Harry blinked, and put a bit of warmth into his eyes. He didn't need to look like her superior, demanding her report. He wanted to be her friend, right at this moment.

With a rueful smile, Hermione continued, "I know, Harry, I know. It was almost too easy, you know? I made a feminine excuse to leave Grimmauld Place, and pick up some rat poison. And there it sat, on my shelf, for weeks. Crookshanks would lie on it, and nobody noticed the simple bag. You know me, I had a plan before I even got the strychnine." Hermione grinned, a look that faded as quick as dew in the sun. "I procrastinated, I said I'd do it tommorrow - and then, three nights ago, I knew that there weren't enough tommorrows _left_. That I had to _do_ it, or it wouldn't get done before..." _Not a whim then - exactly as I had suspected._ A part of Harry wanted to shout, to scream **_Why?_**

"Before?" Harry asked, curious almost despite himself.

"Before Tom Riddle dies." Hermione at last said softly, her hands wringing. "Before the war fragments, and weakens, and dies. Better she die fighting, even enemies in her midst?" Hermione's face twisted into some strange smirk, her upper lip pulled down and the corners of her lips turned up. _She'd have done this anyway. She **meant** to do this._

"How _long_ , Hermione," Harry prompted, when Hermione had made it clear she wasn't going to speak up.

Hermione started, coming back to the conversation, as she spoke in a low voice, looking downward, "Years." She looked up into Harry's eyes, and he could see the unspilled tears shining within her brown eyes. "Since we met with Malfoy."

"In the cave?" Harry said, and Hermione nodded acquiescence.

Harry closed his eyes, breathing deeply and slowly, letting moments slip out of his grasp until he had control over his voice again. "I should have known it wasn't that easy - it never is, with Malfoy." Harry's voice vibrated with rue and a deeper, nameless emotion. "Was this his price?" He demanded of Hermione, his voice still soft but no less firm.

"His price?" Hermione asked, confusion clear in his voice.

"For the library. For a way to defeat Tom." Harry Potter said, his voice threatening to break out of his control, and quivering with the need to do so.

"No," Hermione said softly, her eyes meeting Harry's in that way she had - decisive enough that he knew she spoke true, however unbelievable it was.

Before Hermione could open her mouth to say another word, Harry growled softly, "I think it's time you told me everything. You _know_ how I hate being in the dark."

Hermione looked into his eyes, her brown eyes gone flinty with strengthening resolve. Harry felt a moment of indecision cross his mind - had he just done the wrong thing?

Hermione nodded, and Harry released a breath he hadn't known he was holding.

[a/n: Like it? Write a review, why don'tcha?]


	45. Measure Twice, Harry Potter

Hermione Granger suddenly stiffened, and Harry - who had fought Voldemort several times, and thus was entitled to combat reflexes - had to grip the bedsheet to prevent himself from rolling under the bed. "Harry James Potter!" Hermione cried, "What _ever_ made you think that I'd be willing to murder for _Malfoy_? For _any_ reason whatsoever?" Hermione exploded in a sudden fit of laughter, which did nothing to cool the smouldering anger in her eyes. If anything, it inflamed it. "For _Malfoy_? For a _library_? To _win_?" Hermione kept cackling, her eyes striking like flint against Harry's, as she said, "My god, man! No!"

By now, Harry was hanging his head, feeling ashamed. He knew his best friend, he really did. And she wasn't the type... "I don't know, Mione... I don't know... I'm sorry, I know you wouldn't - but, it's Malfoy."

"Harry Potter - that's just my point. When has Draco Malfoy ever done a _damn thing_ that hasn't been in his best interest?"

Harry flushed, and said, "I wasn't thinking..."

"That's for sure! You know me better than _that_! You know even Draco Malfoy, who you haven't _ever_ talked to, better than _that_!" Hermione was still laughing, her breath coming in gasps, as Harry shook his head wryly. Leave it to Hermione to figure out the basics of what you already knew, and then tell you exactly what you had forgot.

Harry said quietly, "Then why? What's going on?"

"When Draco Malfoy teleported me to a cavern, he had a plan to keep the peace." Hermione started.

"But... we're at war...?" Harry asked promptingly.

"What's the use of winning the war if you just make more enemies in the process?" Hermione asked.

"They're the ones that made enemies of you, Hermione. By trying to hunt you down and kill you."

"When did you ask a Slytherin to fight for us? Even if you had - Draco Malfoy had his mother and father in Tom's line of sight... Could you really have asked him to do something that would have killed his parents?"

"I... I don't know." Harry Potter said, meeting his friend's eyes.

"They're not all evil. And we're not all good." Hermione said gravely. Harry Potter simply looked at Hermione -knowing that, above all else, she needed to tell someone about all this.

"Go on..." Harry said, mentally thinking of Severus Snape, whom no one would ever mistake for being either good or evil. At least, no one would without questioning himself. Harry had certainly done enough of that, to the point that he was seriously sick of it. And yet, it seemed to gnaw at him, like a dog worrying a bone.

"There are people in this world that once they make an enemy, they can't seem to let it go - not for love, not for money - not even to _win a war_. You remember how Sirius and Snape used to snap at each other, the hostility thicker between them than it was between _either_ of them and the _Death Eaters_." Hermione said rationally, her logical voice trying to cut through the quick stab of sadness that Harry felt. His arm wrapped around Hermione, feeling her warmth even as he clung to her - sending a message of support when it was really Harry who was drowning - drowning in thoughts of death and loss.

"Yeah, I remember." Harry Potter said gently, filled with deep-seated thoughts of guilt, and a burning hatred that pumped his veins with fire.

"Molly Weasley was one of them." Hermione said, and Harry's eyes widened. He had never seen Molly lose her temper - not _really_. Not with the twins, not with Percy, not even when Bill got married behind her back. "She lost her two brothers during Tom's first rise." Harry nodded, he had heard this before. "Molly Weasley swore that her brothers would be avenged - but! She never figured out exactly who had killed them." Hermione's eyes looked bleak - an expression that Harry Potter had rarely seen on her face. Hermione always seemed to have an answer for everything - or the boundless determination to get through and keep going.

"Instead, she started killing people who supported Tom Riddle. And Harry, she never stopped." Hermione shook her head. "She wasn't _going_ to stop, even if the war ends for real this time."

"How can you know that?" Harry Potter asked, the question gentle.

"Because we asked Professor Snape - and he said that he hasn't been able to find the Prewitts' killers, not in sixteen years of searching." Harry's mind caught at one bit of that - Snape was _still_ searching, even embedded in the Death Eaters. He expected to be back, somehow. To be, and here Harry gulped, forgiven.

"That and - Malfoy had a file." Hermione Granger said, pausing.

"A file?"

"Evidence. Pictures, statements, you name it. Suspected killings, confirmed killings - _whitewashed_ killings." Hermione said, her voice lowering to an urgent whisper.

"I want to see it." Harry Potter said, suddenly - though he truly trusted Hermione with his life, he still wanted to hold it in his hands, to feel the weight of judgement.

"You will - but, Harry! That wasn't the only file. Malfoy was thorough, and he had found the vengeful on both sides." Harry's breath caught, again.

"So this was more than just one...?" Harry asked, and Hermione nodded firmly. "He... he didn't want you to...?" Harry stumbled through the question.

"He had recruits. From both sides. People who could - and would - kill for peace. We talked with them together, after you left - convincing them of what needed to be done." Hermione said, instinctively leaving out exactly how Draco Malfoy had gotten them all there.

"Let me see the file." Harry said, with a heavy heart.

[a/n: Keen readers will note that Hermione had said that she'd be willing to murder someone, should it prove necessary. While that is true, please consider two things. First, Hermione would have taken a lot of convincing to go along with murdering Molly Weasley. Second, Draco Malfoy - should he be bent on murder - would have picked someone more relevant to himself.

Killing Molly is likely to rend the Order apart, but as both Harry and Hermione understand that Draco wants Tom Riddle dead, that's a dead issue.

Write a review, we're almost through this scene.]


	46. Lurking in the shadows, a stray thought

Hermione Granger stood, and with an air of command resembling a nurse doing triage, she said clearly, "I Love Lucy."

With a pop, the house-elf appeared, giving her a gentle wink, "What can I help you with, child?" Harry shot Hermione a _look_ , as it was quite clear that his best friend wasn't a child. Was Malfoy brainwashing his house elves?

"I need the file on Molly Weasley - actually, just send me a copy, leave the original."

"You realize I mustn't allow a copy to leave my sight, same as the original?" the house-elf said crisply, with a remarkable lack of cringing or effusive gushing. _Maybe those only came out when a house-elf was around its master..._

"Of course I do. Your master would be proud of your diligence." Hermione said, kneeling on one knee to look the house-elf in the eyes. Harry relaxed, slightly, _There's the Hermione that I know. The one who doesn't think a second before treating everyone as equals._

Harry Potter heard two distinct pops, and the house-elf was there, with the red-n-gold folder, neatly emblazoned with Molly Weasley in simple lettering. With a gentle bow, the house-elf left the folder in Harry Potter's open hands, and retreated quickly to the edge of the room. Harry watched the old elf go, and smiled at her. Her mien was dignified, and her standing in the corner left Harry with the definite feeling of being watched and attended on. It wasn't someone trying to hide, or vanish - or anything but be helpful by their silent attendance.

Harry Potter opened the file, a strange and unexamined feeling crawling around the back of his head. He wasn't sure exactly what he was looking for, in fact. After all, he _knew_ it was going to be convincing. Hermione had been right when she had said she wouldn't have gone along without evidence. He paused a second, green eyes blinking, as he looked at the sheer length of the file. And then he began to turn pages, looking for _God knows what!_ The whole thing recorded a rather impressive record during the first Wizarding War - Molly Weasley had been far from a homebody then, even if she did play the housewife well. That had been an integral part of her husband's entrapment of quite a few Death Eaters... Scattered here and there were notations about excessive force, about torture, about deaths that couldn't be credibly considered accidents. Nothing... nothing alarming enough that Dumbledore had said anything about it.

 _This wasn't it, but still..._ Harry Potter stopped and closed the folder, looking up gravely at Hermione Granger. "There's too much here. And, if Severus Snape knew, I'm certain Dumbledore had at least an inkling..."

For the first time since they arrived, Hermione Granger's eyes sparkled with something other than tears, "You think?"

"Yeah, I do. They _let_ her do this - continue this campaign."

"Are you sure Snape knew?" Hermione asked, in her excitement forgetting to put Professor in front of the Potion Master's name.

Harry frowned, thinking it over, "No... but did he seem surprised?"

"Blazes if I could tell! And even if he had, he might have simply been surprised that Draco Malfoy had found out so much!"

"But..." Harry said, pausing a moment to think, "There's more than just Molly. Dumbledore couldn't have been unaware of everyone." It had seemed like quite a list, as Mione had said it - upwards of a dozen, easily. per side.

"In times of war..." Hermione said in her best Dumbledore impression, "For the greater good..."

Harry shook his head, his green eyes cold as he met Hermione's gaze before saying, "I can't help but think this wasn't for the greater good. Like not giving a trial for Sirius... it's a stain on our honor."

Hermione giggled, and said, "Harry...!" her eyes warm as she met his.

Harry Potter looked down at the papers, trying as he thumbed through them to figure out what thought was lurking around the edges of his mind.

[a/n: okay, I lied. Next chapter will end this scene. I hope. If you like this, and want more of it, write a review!]


	47. Stop Right There

One page, two, a dozen, three, eight, thirteen. Harry was rifling through the pages, absurdly certain that he was missing something. It was his gut talking, but Harry trusted his instincts. Hermione waited silently, her head bowed, weighty thoughts no doubt tumbling through her thick curls.

Page 18. It must have been the third time Harry had looked at the page, but this time he stopped. "Son of a bitch," he muttered softly, aware of just how much like an American Western he sounded. _I... I remember this girl. So does Malfoy - after all, it was his head._ Harry Potter sat up straighter. With his finger still pointing down at the photo, he said to Hermione, "This wasn't just political. It was personal too."

Hermione looked up, blinking at the certainty etched on Harry's face. "How do you know?" She asked curiously.

"Malfoy..." Harry's voice trailed off, as he thought about what exactly to say. "I saw her face, in his head - he was there, when her parents were... murdered." Harry's voice had started out calm, but beneath the surface, the icy anger fought to surface. _No,_ Harry thought with dogged determination.

"I see. Is personal better or worse?" Hermione asked, questions swirling in her eyes.

"Neither, Both - I don't know." Harry roughly shoved the papers to the side, as he stood and began to pace - the personal revelation hadn't bothered Potter in the slightest. In fact, it made him the slightest shred more certain to trust Malfoy. It was another piece, and one that made the rest fit together just a little better. Maybe they'd fit better still if he threw away some of the older ones... people could change, after all. "He knew we'd be here. Knew we'd be having this conversation..." Harry let some of the anger surface, to stem the possibility of him punching through a window or a wall. His anger felt warm enough to burn water.

Hermione shook her head firmly, her brown curls rippling out like waves on the Black Lake. Harry paused a moment to watch, letting some of his anger drain out through his feet. Slowly, she shook her head. "No, I don't think so. This is an _unlikely_ conversation for us to be having, from his point of view."

While Hermione had been thinking, Harry Potter's mind had been scrambling. After what she said, it yielded a few more scraps of thought - _If you must hate someone, hate me. I'm used to it._ The thought of being played, of someone not only withholding information, but dealing it out in dribbles and drabbles - it was infuriating. Playing for a bit of time to come to terms with it all, Harry Potter asked, "What do you mean?"

"First, Malfoy's never given you enough credit. I doubt he'd think that you'd discover what I'd done, nor that you'd talk with me like this about it, before coming to any decisions." Hermione laced her fingers together in front of her lips. "No, if he thought we'd be having this conversation, I think he would have told you upfront." Despite her words, Hermione looked certain.

"Second, from a purely oddsmaking point of view, you'd be far more likely to discover this in the heat of the moment - or during the lead up to..." Hermione cut off, her face again looking stricken.

Harry sat down on the bed, leaning backward, looking up at the ceiling. "Malfoy said that if I knew the whole plan, that I'd say yes." Oddly, that thought served to ground Harry Potter, his anger draining away again. Malfoy hadn't been trying to _trick_ him, he had been - if it was possible - _straightforward_ about keeping secrets and having secret plans.

"Would you have?" Hermione asked quietly.

"Do I know the whole plan?" Harry asked, his words like a flag cracking in the breeze.

"Yes, just not the details." Hermione said firmly. Harry's voice filled in Malfoy explaining to him why he couldn't be told - _he hadn't needed to tell me that. It just invited argument. . . Maybe - could he have actually wanted to tell me? Slytherins cherish secrets._ Harry heard Snape's voice saying dryly in his head, "What better way to bind people together than by sharing things dear to you?"

"I don't know." Harry said crossly, knowing that most of his objections had died with Molly - and with that picture. _Sod it_ , but Harry Potter hated being manipulated. And that little girl bore a surprising resemblance to Harry Potter himself - suddenly parentless. At least she had known her parents. Harry felt an inkling of pity for Malfoy - even as young as that - five, was it? - he had known the death that comes in the night, suddenly and without explanation. It was a different death than sickness or accident. "God Damn it, I don't know." Harry shot up off the bed, pacing. Getting to the edge of the room, he whirled around. "That _really_ pisses me off, you know? That Malfoy might have been right to leave me in the dark!"

"Even if he wasn't right, doesn't it help to understand he thought he was doing what was best?" Hermione offered tentatively.

"No, blast it, it doesn't!" Harry snarled, his hands balling into fists. "You shouldn't have needed to do this _by yourself_. We're a _team_. You, me, and Ron."

Hermione said clearly and gracefully, "That's why I had you there, you know. I wasn't going to agree, completely, without you guys there."

"But - you didn't say a word! It's been five years!"

"It... it was better to stay quiet."

"WHYYY?" Harry cried, his voice shaking the floorboards.

"Harry, I love you dearly, but you can't act."

Grumbling, Harry muttered, "I managed to fool you, didn't I?"

"I was griefstricken, Harry." Hermione's tone reeked of exasperation. " _And_ you'll have to keep it up. Around Ron, especially."

"I can't help it, I'm so angry... I want to kill someone." Harry's eyes were cold - Hermione's breath stilled.

"Who?" Hermione asked with a directness that Harry valued.

"Malfoy, me, you." Harry spat, still pacing across the well-trod floor. Hermione couldn't have had such weighty things on her mind..., could she?

"Well, be practical." Hermione said, crossing her legs and looking for all the world like Prof. McGonagall. "Kill Malfoy first - otherwise he'll know you're coming. Then kill me, and finally, yourself. After all, if you kill yourself, you can hardly kill the rest of us."

The room dissolved into laughter, a sweet, airy release from the choking, fulminous anger.

[a/n: Have I gotten everything? Harry, as usual, is right pissed off.

Up next: more stuff with Hermione researching the kiss.

Write a review, love it or leave it.]


	48. Out There

[a/n: This is a few weeks after the last chapter. Potter's won, the day is done, gone the sun. So we open in the library...]

Hermione's brow creased in a pensive frown, as she stared down at another book that had proved completely and utterly fruitless. She was in Hogwarts' library (miraculously, it had survived, due more to the people-eating books that the librarian had released than anything else.), with a stack of books half as tall as she was. She was _not_ going to let herself get distracted by _out there_. Too many things were happening, too quickly. Hermione Granger knew she needed a break, and looking up just what Draco Malfoy had meant certainly had _seemed_ like it would do the trick.

Problem was, she wasn't finding a thing - and that always lent her the frantic energy of a caged squirrel, bouncing furiously from one end of the cage to the other. Not relaxing, perhaps, but at least normal. Nothing else felt normal anymore.

"Well, well," a familiar voice purred, as Hermione glanced up, her eyes met by the abyssal darkness of Snape's rich gaze. "Irony of ironies, the know-it-all can't find something in the library, of all places."

"Professor." Hermione said, trying to calm her nerves that had tried to tell her to draw her wand on the black figure looming out of the darkness. "Perhaps you might be of some assistance?"

Professor Snape set the book he had been carrying down on the table, and laughed - a rich, velvety sound, "And spoil the fun? Not I, Miss Granger. Not I."

As Severus Snape whirled - getting the last word again - Hermione sent him a baleful glare. They were making fun of her! Laughing at her! Glaring now at the table, Hermione Granger pushed back her chair (which nearly toppled from the shove of her thighs as she stood), and stalked off, privately vowing to kill certain Slytherins, as soon as she found a way to do it cleanly.

The unread book that Snape had laid on the table intrigued Blaise, who stepped out of the shadow of another bookshelf. _Was that_ _ **actually**_ _a Romance novel?_ He thought as he picked it up, smirking, and laid it back down again. _Draco's jest had more legs than a spider_ , Blaise thought with an amused grin. _It would appear I have a letter to write._

[a/n: What, you thought Snape wouldn't get in on the fun? Watching the knowitall not able to find something _perfectly obvious_ appeals to Snape's sense of humor.

This was originally going to be the last scene, but there's onesie, maybe twosie more for all those good readers out there.

Leave a review and I'll consider working on a sequel!]


	49. They're all laughing at me!

It wasn't quite that moment that Hermione Granger got a chance to vent her rage. No, for the next two weeks, she was stuck using her wits _constructively_ \- using her anger to fuel her campaign. The Minister of Magic. Two full weeks of town halls, of debates (Malfoy made a terrible debater, apparently - not a drop of sweat, but not an ounce of substance either. Vote for me because I'm Pureblood - and hot. His ego was truly off the charts), of cooing at babies (Hermione couldn't bring herself to kiss them - they had germs!).

With a sigh, Hermione tossed her shoes off as she strode into the Burrow. Fleur wasn't there (she was cooking, of course), and the whole place was slightly less harried than usual. Gin was still there, and Hermione hollered up to her, "Ginny!" Hermione couldn't help but smile as Gin bounced down the stairs, red hair flowing after her like a train.

"Hermione! How's the campaign?" Gin cried, as she jumped into Hermione's arms in a quick, lively hug.

"Peachy, if you can believe it." Hermione said with an irrepressible grin. "Let's go upstairs! I want to hear all about your trip!"

Gin blinked, as she noticed Hermione giving her "The Look" - it was the third time she had _ever_ seen that look on Hermione Granger's face. Gin mostly recognized it because it was something that she wore often herself. Hermione had always been there for her, when she was silly, or heartbroken or anything. With a tug of Hermione's hand, Gin dragged her determinedly upstairs. She'd figure out what was going on shortly, no doubt.

Hermione Granger dashed through the door, giggling, and Gin entered more softly, closing the door. Hermione was already sitting on her bed, and Gin looked her up and down. She didn't look upset. "So, spit it out. What is it?"

Hermione Granger changed like a thundercloud billowing out of nowhere on a muggy summer's day, her eyes blazing, as she stared up at Ginny. "They're laughing at me! They're all laughing at me! I can't STAND it when people laugh at me. I'm such a fool, I shouldn't _care_!"

Hermione was never more beautiful than when she was enraged, Gin thought with a smile - At least, if she wasn't upset at you. The flushed cheeks suited her well. "Is this about the election?" Gin asked, though she was pretty sure it wasn't.

"God, no! The _Slytherins_!" Hermione said, as if this was immediately obvious - which was a sure clue that it wasn't.

"Did Snape say something? Or was it Blaise?" Gin ventured, wondering what was going on.

"Yes, and yes - and before you ask why, I am going to _kill_ Draco Malfoy!" Hermione shouted, and Gin was glad (again) that she had a permanent silencing spell on her room.

Gin looked at Hermione Granger dubiously, and asked, "And this _isn't_ about the election?" _Malfoy was running against her, after all._

"Not in the slightest. Harry hasn't told you much about this vacation you're going on, has he?" Hermione eyed Ginny with a calculating stare.

"No, I thought he wanted it to be a surprise." Ginny said, looking suddenly a whole lot more interested. What did Harry have to do with the Slytherins? And their vacation, of all things?

"You remember - of course you remember. Ginny, I never did tell you how we got to the bottom of those disappearances, did I? When it seemed like everyone was being whisked away - to be killed, tortured, or abused?" Hermione Granger looked nervous, and that gave Gin a queasy feeling in the bottom of her stomach.

"What happened?" Gin said, leaning up against the door for support.

"I was the last one taken. There's nothing like the feeling of teleporting out of a battle - and then freezing. Almost like you're cold and dead." Hermione's eyes were intent, but staring off into nowhere.

"Oh, god! How horrible."

"Waking up was worse. I was tied to a chair, and Draco Malfoy was looming over me."

Gin's eyes grew steadily wider as Hermione told the rest of her tale. "So, Draco Malfoy is paying for us to go on vacation?"

"If you want to call it a vacation when you need to have you wand ready at all times, yes." Hermione said with a toothy grin. "Sounds pretty stressful to me."

"Still, London! Paris! Munchen! Osaka!" Gin said, fighting the urge to twirl around. Hermione saw, and cracked up laughing.

When Hermione looked up again, her face was solemn. "The boys left then, as I had a few loose ends to tie up. You _can't_ tell them what I'm going to tell you now." Hermione said, half-standing to grasp Gin's hands, her gesture almost that of supplication. Which was perfectly ridiculous, as Hermione Granger didn't do that.

Gin smiled, and said, "of course I won't tell them."

"As I said, I wasn't the only one kidnapped. Malfoy had been... quite discriminatory in which people to take - but they were both Light and Dark. He needed me there to get each person briefed."

"Briefed?"

"Yeah. Because we needed to make sure that this peace would hold." Hermione laced her hands in her lap, before looking up slowly, "There are people who would have broken it, you know."

"Death Eaters can't accept they've lost, can they?" Gin said.

"Not just them. Everyone lost something in the war. Some people lost their sense of perspective as well." Hermione said, and Gin was left to remember her brothers, placing another wreath at Lee Jordan's grave.

Gin looked at Hermione, and said crisply, "Spill it, sister! Tell me why you really wanted to find me."

Hermione looked almost tentative, and that was odd, because hermione was never tentative. "At the end - when we were all done, Draco Malfoy said to me, 'just one more wizarding tradition to seal the deal.'" Hermione looked down at her feet, and mumbled something indecipherable.

"What? What did he do?" Gin asked.

Hermione Granger looked up at Ginny, and said with a curiously blank look in her eyes, "He kissed me." She said this flatly, and then her eyes sparked. "Then, he said, 'have fun looking that up, mudblood!'"

Ginny fought to keep her legs from going so soft as to send her crashing to the bottom of the door. "What?" she asked, frantically trying to buy herself some time. "Really?" she said, quieter this time.

" _Yes!_ " Hermione said, shooting to her feet and throwing up her hands. "And I _can't_ find a single word about it!"

 _Wait, Hermione doesn't **know**? That was nearly five years ago...Do I tell her? Should I tell her? She's probably going to see Malfoy after the election... _ Gin Weasley had waited too long, and Hermione had just gone on-

"I tried asking Blaise - but all he said was 'I wouldn't want to deprive you of your fun!'" Hermione snarled, and said, "I can't find anything about it! It doesn't _exist_."

"And just last week, Professor Severus Snape comes by to laugh at the knowitall who can't find something in the _library_!" Hermione was throwing her hands around Gin's small room, and Gin was mildly concerned Granger might break something, well, breakable.

 _Wait, she still doesn't know? How in the hell...? Wow, when you put it like that, no wonder Snape was laughing. Something that's in half a hundred books in Hogwarts, and Hermione Granger can't find it._ Looking up from her private thoughts, Gin saw Hermione, still pacing and fuming.

"Hermione" she said tentatively, and then spoke up a bit louder, "Hermione-"

"What!?" Hermione snapped.

"You _can't_ be angry with Snape for having a laugh. It's not like he's exactly had many of them, these past few years."

Hermione merely growled.

Gin's eyes twinkled in response, as she said airily, "Besides, it wouldn't be funny at all if the answer wasn't in the library."

"You're all out to get me!" Hermione howled, and then collapsed laughing - her anger blown clear out of her.

 _She'll be seeing Draco Malfoy in just a week or two - guess I'll let him have the dubious honor of telling her what he did._ "I think Draco Malfoy likes you!" Gin singsonged, wanting to get Hermione out of her foul mood. A pillow to the face was the best response she had heard all day, as the room descended into a flurry of pillows and feathers.

[a/n: Well, Ginny knows what Draco did. Have you figured it out?

Write me a note, a review? Looks like two more epilogue chapters, and then a Hufflepuff's guide to Slytherin thought]

[Oh, thank all the devils and gods above for the reader who caught my mistake above! Changed Molly to Fleur (under the thought that she would take over the Burrow, and look after Arthur)]


	50. Affix Title Here

After all the feathers had fallen, Gin asked Hermione in a deceptively casual voice, "When Malfoy kissed you, was there anyone else there?"

Hermione frowned, remembering that _struck dumb with shock_ look on Narcissa Malfoy's face, "Yeah, his mother - why?" _Of course he'd have had a witness._

"Oh, no reason." Gin said lightly, standing and saying, "I think I hear the boys downstairs." As the room was really too small to accommodate them all, the two girls danced down the narrow staircase into the living room, where Hermione piled onto the couch beside the boys. Gin, however, paused, saying, "Harry Potter!" with a stamp of her foot.

"She told you then?" Harry said with a bit of a sigh. "Thanks, Hermione - I wasn't really sure just how to start."

"And so, the brave Gryffindor leaves it to someone else to do it!" Hermione said with a bright chuckle.

"Of course! Who else can I count on through thick and thin?" Harry asked with that green-eyed grin of his.

"How about your girlfriend?" Gin said without a trace of heat, sitting on the arm of the sofa. Seeing this, Harry rested his head on her thigh.

"Even better..." he muttered sleepily, hand gently caressing her thigh.

"What I don't get" Gin started, "is why those blasted songs are still on the wireless."

"What songs?" Ron asked.

"Those songs, the ones that make fun of Harry. I mean, he won, didn't he? They sound downright silly once the 'cowardly, sniveling' kid wins, don't they?" Gin asked, her eyes slightly widened in confusion.

Harry answered sleepily, "Oh, that's just Malfoy. He's congratulating me, I guess."

"Congratulating you?!" Ron laughed, "Now I've heard everything. Malfoy congratulating Potter!"

Harry responded blearily, "Either that or thanking me for not needing to compose another of those blasted songs."

"Draco Malfoy, thanking Harry Potter? I think that hell itself has frozen over, and the devil's donned ice skates." Hermione giggled, and it turned infectious, until they were all laughing.

"Harry, if Draco wants Hermione to win - why is he running?" Gin asked.

Ron spoke up, "Why, so someone else doesn't - sure enough. Same reason he's found every bit of eye candy in the country to be photographed with."

"How does that help?" Gin asked.

"Well, he's pays the press, but they have to have something to write about."

"It's not just that..." Harry said, still a little sleepy. "He's trying to look unserious - the type of person some enterprising Slytherin might be able to push around, or even guide to the correct conclusions."

Hermione nodded thoughtfully, "He won't need to push anyone out of the race, if they're all planning on manipulating him..."

"Good thing he doesn't have the vote, huh?" Harry responded. _Good thing Malfoy's not that stupid._

[a/n: endless thanks to the reader who caught the error in the last chapter. Write a review, folks - one more chapter to go.]


	51. A Lion's dinner is always squirming

Draco Malfoy slipped into the Minister of Magic's office, his gait quiet and stealthy - more learned at other people's houses than at Hogwarts or the Manor, both of which tended towards stone. Gently, quietly, he closed the door behind him. Then he turned around - and froze.

As the Minister's exquisite leather chair pivoted, Draco Malfoy straightened, assuming an arrogant confidence that he never used while sneaking around. Counterproductive. _Who was there?_ Draco's eyes widened as he saw the freckled face of the Weaselette - looking not in the least surprised to see him. _Hmph._ Draco Malfoy thought to himself, his thoughts dancing madly, scrambling to find purchase. _Why was she here?_

"Draco Malfoy," Gin Weasley said, with intent eyes, and hands that fiddled with her wand in her lap, the way a cat batted idly at a mouse - prepared at the instant to pounce. Draco's was still up his sleeve, of course - and would stay that way if he had any sense at all.

"Ginevra Weasley, it is my pleasure." Draco Malfoy said, his voice lacking most of his usual flirtatious affect. You didn't greet a warrior the way you greeted a doll, after all - it would be an insult, and would most certainly be treated as such.

"Indeed." Gin said, leaning forward slightly, "Decided to beat the crowd?"

Draco Malfoy shrugged insouciantly, saying simply, "Perhaps."

"Fortunate, that. I've been meaning to have a word with you." Gin Weasley said, pausing slightly. Draco Malfoy said nothing at all, simply arrogantly stood there, waiting - _listening_. "What are your intentions towards Hermione Granger?" The Weaslette's eyes were steady, almost hard.

Draco Malfoy fought to not stiffen, his mind busy thinking about all manner of things. Possibilities swirled through his head. _Trust her._ His mind said, and it was rarely wrong. Draco Malfoy leaned forward, slightly, crossing his arms and managing to seem more open despite it all - even the devilish cant to his smirk. "I have no idea." The truth, put plainly, had a tendency to sound like a lie. Or maybe it was just that Slytherins were so rarely entirely honest.

Gin Weasley's eyebrows cocked up, just a tad, and her lips twitched, "Really?" _Typical, you can be as honest as you want with a Gryffindor, and they'll never believe you._

"I'm not lying. If I do figure out my "intentions" I'd be happy to let you know." Draco Malfoy said, thinking venomously, _She told a_ _ **Weasley**_ _!_

"And in return, you want what? I know Slytherins don't offer anything for free." Draco nearly smirked at her words, recognizing the calculating look in her eyes as one that the twins often got - shortly before they made a deal with a Slytherin.

"Don't bother your... traveling companions with distant _possibilities_." Draco Malfoy said steadily, needing her word on something that the Weaselette had already implicitly agreed to. She was here alone, after all.

"Promise you won't hurt her." Gin said coldly, her eyes cold and sharp as glass.

"I can't do that." Draco Malfoy said, shaking his head, and pausing for a moment - his eyes seeking the left side of the room. Pictures and memorabilia from dozens of Ministers, all in a pile. Too precious to be thrown out, and too stupid to actually display. At last, Draco said, "Hurting her is not a goal of mine and it never will be."

A snort was all the response from Gin, and Draco's eyes sharpened as he spoke, "I can swear to that if you like."

"It's not good enough. You could hurt her incidentally, by happenstance, inadvertently. Lose a pawn, gain a knight."

Draco spun on his heel, walking the whole way to the edge of the room, and then spinning around, "I could. It would have to be for something important." Draco said as he strode forward.

"If you hurt her, you'll hurt ten times worse." Gin Weasley said in a tone that brooked no dissent. Naturally, Draco Malfoy had to oblige.

Giving in to his anger, Draco said, "Why, in all the seven realms, do you think you need to remind me of this? I am a Slytherin, a fact you surely haven't forgotten. I value self-preservation more than your displays of foolish bravado. I already know that." Draco gave a huge sigh, and then said firmly - with a shrewd twinkle in his eye, "You had to say that, didn't you?"

Gin Weasley nodded, before climbing to her feet. As she walked by Draco she turned - her face nearly in his - and said, "I didn't tell her. I'll let you have the honors. Good luck."

As Gin Weasley left the room, Draco heard her say to Blaise Zambini, "Here to keep the Ministry from falling down around our ears? Good. I'll join you."

As the door shut, Draco Malfoy wore the slightest of smiles, thinking, _I am **so** dead meat._

[Last chapter, so write a review. Did I use too much italics? Were the visual scenes too hard to read? Do you want a sequel? Where did I do well, where did I screw up?

I have a few scenes in the sequel already in my head, so if there's enough interest, I may go ahead and write it. (Unlike The Floating World, this one wasn't explicitly supposed to be a prequel).

This one really wasn't planned as more than one loooong conversation, I swear!

There will be a Hufflepuff's guide to Slytherins coming up, so stay tuned!]


	52. A Hufflepuff guide to Slytherin minds

Okay, so a few of my readers have asked, "What the hell's going on in Draco's mind?"

The story starts nearly two months before the actual first chapter, when Bellatrix got that mad idea to dose Draco with a soulmate potion. Draco was beyond incensed with the whole matter, considering it useless and a waste of time. After all, he had hardly known (in a more biblical sense) more than the Slytherin girls, and they were clearly not his soulmates. He had, just because (alright, for fear of it actually being Pansy - he'd rather do without a soulmate than have it be her), come up with a decent alibi.

Imagine Draco's fury at the potion actually working (and him finding out that he recognized the scent - thousands upon thousands of witches, and here he gets someone he knows! Fate is cruel.). He stumbles out the alibi (purely by force of habit, his face was white as a sheet), and then has to deal with Bellatrix conniving to get him trips to France for the next month or so.

But back to Draco - he's furious, first, because Bellatrix was right (that's actually the biggest part of his anger.), and only secondly because it was Hermione Granger - sanctimonious goody-two-shoes and general knowitall Teacher's Pet. His best response to that is a general _Her?_ (Unlike a considerable portion of DM/HG fics, he hasn't been in love with her. In fact, no romantic thoughts entirely... putting her in a position shared only by Gin Weasley. He's had fun entertaining himself with plots to get into practically everyone else in school. (yes, including McGonagall). Granger and the Weaslette hadn't seemed possible, let alone interesting).

After blowing off some steam (courtesy of a few priceless ming vases imbued with Merlin-knows-what), he did what came naturally - started cracking the books, looking to see if there was something that he could make of this situation.

He comes up with the idea for an alliance - based solely on the idea that knowing she's his soulmate makes her predictable. Trustable, even.

Because Draco Malfoy isn't just looking to get rid of Lord Voldemort. He's looking for peace, and that's a far more fragile quantity.

But peace, as always, is something negotiated. You don't get peace by killing the other side, unless you're willing to make it everyone. And Draco doesn't feel like it's his job to die. So, he comes up with another solution. Let Granger manage the "reformers" and Draco will manage the "pureblood elite" (who are more of a handful anyway).

It's a decent plan, but it all falls apart if Weasley and Potter get even the slightest hint that Malfoy's maneuvering to have them out of the country so that he can make a move on Granger. Nothing's more likely to cause those two to put their heels in the ground and not move an inch. [Draco, for what it's worth, was telling the absolute truth when he told Gin that it was a "distant" possibility. He meant in terms of time, but was quite willing to let Gin think it was merely unlikely. Pity she didn't take the bait, eh? Lying by distraction is such a Slytherin trait. ] And Draco's honestly not trying to get them to leave just for that. It's merely a nice sidebenefit.

Draco's being pretty stubborn about them not being on the same side... why is that? Well, first, it's because his side fights behind masks. He doesn't want these fine folks to die because they're sitting around wondering, "Is that Draco behind the mask?" Nah, way better that they remember that he's not on their side. Secondarily, it's a bit of a feint to dispel any thoughts on Ron or Harry's part that Draco is trying to get close to Hermione.

As to what the hell to do about the actual soulmate bit of this? Draco's being perfectly honest when he says to Gin he's not sure. He's being a typical cautious Slytherin, seeing potential for something there, but very unwilling to say "yes, this is going to work." He figures, if he winds up saying anything to Gin before the two years are up, it'll be "no way in hell."

So, everyone's asking, I'm sure, "what was up with that kiss?" The kiss, when done in front of Draco's mum (it needed witnesses), is a rather formal commitment on Draco's part (none implied on Hermione's), saying that she's his intended. It's the sort of romantic gesture that was done in times of war, when someone was going off to battle. There are ways out of it (though Draco would have to choose one of the more obscure, as the traditional "send back her token of favor along with apologies and see what punishment she prescribes" rather requires Hermione to have given him a token). Importantly, this is the sort of thing that is simply all over the romance section of any Wizarding Library. It's why everyone recognizes it (and why Blaise, in particular, is a bit disturbed. Draco Malfoy had shown no interest, whatsoever, in Granger, and Blaise doesn't see any reason why that's changed).

As to why Draco decided after doing that to insult her? To challenge her?

Well, let's put it this way. They've been out of school for long enough that he's not sure if Weasley and Granger are an item. His goal? _Think of me_. He wants to make certain he's on her mind (while not, perhaps, in a romantic way - he really doesn't want to have to ask himself if he's the reason she died in battle). Malfoy likes puzzles, and so does Granger. He makes himself into enough of a puzzle that she spends bits and pieces of time trying to figure him out - for five freaking years.

(Malfoy's not about to just up and explain this to Granger. Not even what the kiss means, which should make an interesting "welcome back" scene).

Oh, and in case you're wondering, the bit about Snape collapsing? He's instinctively looking to get punched or kicked. That rubbery stance is designed to absorb blows. It's implied that Narcissa came from just as brutal an upbringing as Snape, because she recognizes it.

As to why Draco's such a goddamn bastard at the start of this? Well, Gryffindors are really, really hard to move if they dig their heels in. Keeping them unbalanced is a good way to make certain they are still listening.

Why is Snape helping Granger? While laughing at her? It's his sense of humor shining through. What, you expected cuddly kittens? Severus Snape appreciates irony, and does _not_ do cuddly kittens.

A few bonmots that didn't actually make it into the story:

Draco had a simple idea (a backup plan) for "recoding" this conversation. First, put the conversation itself into a pensieve, as he didn't need to remember all the details. Second, burn into his brain the fragment _she said yes_. Third, arrange with Pansy Parkinson to have a fake, hidden betrothal (complete with some fiscal incentive for her remaining unmarried for the time being). That way, if the Dark Lord ever figured out the fragment (code phrase), he could have something that seemed reasonably authentic. Naturally, this whole idea got shot to shit when he realized he had to teach Potter how to occlude.

Draco in the final battle: He quickly asks Potter (mind to mind) to send Longbottom into the forbidden forest, with utmost haste. As Longbottom leaves, Draco and his 50+ wands (handpicked followers... some of the less enthusiastic of the Dark Lord's men) chase after him. Once Draco and his men are in the Forbidden Forest, he tells them to search Very Carefully, as Longbottom is a master at concealment. They spend the rest of the battle going through the Forbidden Forest inch by inch.

Draco mildly muffs an article: The article in the paper says that a Naval Vessel of Her Majesty's Navy has mysteriously had everyone on it die. Problem is, the people on the ship are in orange jumpsuits and the tattoos they're sporting aren't exactly navy. (Can't expect him to get everything right. He's lucky Voldemort didn't notice).

[Please, please, please, write a review! Did I miss any questions?

This is literally the first story i've finished writing, ever. Comments, criticism, anything. And I am writing about ten other stories, so check them out!]


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